


Jean's Treasure, Eren's Slave

by qwartooty



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Complete, M/M, fic: jtes, temple au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-30
Updated: 2014-09-21
Packaged: 2018-01-21 08:06:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 47,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1543691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwartooty/pseuds/qwartooty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean tries to loot an abandoned temple, which turns out to be not as abandoned as he thought. Cue moody mountain god!Eren and his meddlesome forest friends...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Offering

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JTES is also posted [here](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/post/81194013414/jeans-treasure-erens-slave-part-1).
> 
> This chapter and all chapters following are dedicated to [pocketsizedtitan](http://pocketsizedtitan.tumblr.com/)!

“What are you doing?”

Jean’s heart leapt into his throat, and the golden plate he was examining slipped through his fingers. It landed safely on a patch of spongy moss creeping up from beneath the cracked tiles of the temple floor. Jean tensed his muscles, whether to run or to fight, he wasn’t sure.

He was standing in the biggest room in the temple, where insect wings shimmered lazily among piles of gold and dust. The afternoon sun blew across the room like yellow smoke, filtering through the vines weaving between stone pillars that lined both sides of the room.

Jean searched for the owner of the voice, and spotted two large spheres of polished jade that made his thieving fingers itch. But the jade spheres turned out to be a pair of eyes shining out from across the overgrown rubble, their jeweled brilliance almost too much to handle. But the face that accompanied the eyes ruined the effect on Jean significantly. There in the center of the room sat an angry-looking teenager, watching Jean’s every move from atop a stone pedestal.

“I was just…” Jean trailed off when he saw the boy’s ornate headpiece, airy tunic, and painted nails covered in grime. Curious, he asked, “Who are you?”

The boy leaned forward aggressively, spilling dirt and dust onto the floor around the pedestal. A beam of honey light fell across his dark, bronzed skin, and Jean’s greedy ears picked up the tinkling of bracelets sliding down his sculpted arms.

“Who are _you_?” the boy snapped back.

This shattered Jean’s curiosity and patience spectacularly, and he said, “I asked you first.”

“Wrong,” the other boy replied, grinning in a way that made Jean want to punch out every single perfect tooth (but only after carefully confirming that they were not actually priceless pearls that had his thieving hands itching like crazy). “I was the one who asked first, but with a different question: _What are you doing?_ ”

Jean didn’t answer. He looked again at the stranger’s drool-worthy accessories and his contradicting cleanliness, relaxing as the situation became obvious: Jean must have walked straight into another thief’s jackpot, which didn’t worry him in the least because his competition was an idiot who apparently played Dress Up alone in old abandoned temples.

“Look,” said Jean, “I get that you were here first, and you’re obviously new at this, so it’s only natural for a rooky like you to assume all this gold is yours. Am I right?”

The boy’s teeth disappeared behind a frown. “But it _is_ all mine,” he said.

Jean threw his arms out dramatically. “There, see? That’s exactly the shitty attitude I’m talking about!”

The headpiece slipped. “ _Shitty_ -?”

“Since I’m the more experienced one here,” Jean continued, “I automatically get seniority and first dibs on anything of value that can fit in my bag- but wait! Don’t get angry yet, because I am feeling generous today, so I will leave you with at least… a third of the loot.”

The jade spheres narrowed. “You would steal from a mountain god?”

Jean almost laughed, but then he saw the other boy was very serious.

“ _Mountain god?”_ Jean repeated for clarification. “You don’t seriously believe in that crap, do you?”

“…You don’t?”

“Of course not, it’s stupid superstition!”

“If it’s superstition,” said the boy, “ then why do the villagers seal off the temple exits?”

Jean’s mind got stuck on the word _exit_. “The entrances,” he said slowly, “were wide open when I got here. And the villagers are savages, so what do you expect?”

“What about all these offerings, then?” The bracelets tinkled melodiously as the boy gestured to the treasure behind Jean.

“Just a stupid tradition,” Jean answered, starting to get nervous. Although the other boy didn’t show it, Jean could see his anger building in the tenseness of his shoulders.

The boy lowered his voice. “They were offerings from the village to the mountain god, and you were trying to steal them.”

Jean stepped forward. “Don’t try to scare me away from my winnings!”

The boy stood up on the pedestal and pointed down at Jean. “You’re a thief!”

“So are you!” shouted Jean. “Or do you just sneak into sacred places and try on old clothes for kicks?”

“These are my clothes,” said the boy. “And I’m not a thief.”

“Then what are you?”

The boy gave Jean an incredulous look, gestured to himself with both hands, and said, “I am Eren!” like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“I asked _what_ you are, not _who_ you are.”

“I am the mountain god, obviously.”

“Poppycock!”

“No, no, I said mountain god! Jesus, are you deaf?”

“No, I’m Jean.”

Eren shouted in frustration and jumped down from the pedestal. He stalked toward Jean, leaving a cloud of dust in his wake. “Get your ugly face out of my temple right now, or I’ll eat you!”

“Woah man,” Jean stepped back. “Are you okay?”

Eren’s face was red with anger. “You broke into my temple, tried to take my things-”

“ _Our_ things,” Jean corrected hastily.

“MY. THINGS. And now you’re asking me if I’m okay?!”

“It’s not working,” Jean said smugly. “You can shout and lie and dress up all you want, but I’m taking this gold whether you like it or not.”

“Get out!” Eren shoved Jean with his hands, and Jean found his gaze drawn to the tinkling golden bracelets. He countered the attack lazily, somehow landing a punch directly between Eren’s outstretched arms and nailing him in the nose.

And although Jean knew this mountain god business was all a ruse, he was starting to have serious doubts, especially when the bracelets started to shrink, or when he realized it was actually Eren’s arms that were expanding. And then Jean didn’t have time for doubts, because the room exploded into a cloud of hot steam, and Jean’s perfect hair was totally wet and ruined, and he had just wiped Eren’s blood off his knuckles and the condensation out of his eyes when he saw a giant head and two giant shoulders crashing through the roof of the temple.

Insects took off in swarms, fleeing the sunlight and the large chunks of ceiling crashing down. Jean fled as well, following the insects back through the temple, slipping on dust at almost every turn and knocking into candle-less lanterns as they swung dangerously low with every shake of the mountain.

Jean bolted down the final passage, stumbling on a tree root that ran across the painted mosaic floor. He spotted the white archway that lead outside, and as he passed through it he saw that the archway was white because it was covered from top to bottom with palm-sized slips of parchment.

He did not stop running when he made it to the trees outside, and kept running down the mountain, until his foot caught on something and he fell. Even then, he did not stop moving, and he rolled and slid until he was all the way back to where the ground flattened out. Something roared above him, sounding like faraway thunder, and the ground shook even where Jean was sitting.

When he glanced back up the mountain, he was overcome by fear; over the plumes of dust and dirt rose the silhouette of something Jean couldn’t describe, for it was too mountainous to be a human, and too human to be a mountain. The jade eyes glinted even this far away, and the mountain continued to shake with every roar and heavy stomp.

But Eren couldn’t get past the sealed archways, and Jean never made it past the village below.

The village hunters found Jean tangled up in one of their nets high in a tree. They got him down, took him back to the village as their prisoner (rude), and threw him in a cell built into the ground.

From his barred dugout, Jean could hear the villagers whispering about Eren every time they passed by the bars overhead.

“People are saying it’s an omen.”

“I just don’t understand, we already gave him the annual offering!”

“He hasn’t done anything like this in over two centuries. Do you think it’s some kind of warning?”

And as the hours went on, the villagers grew more anxious.

“Armin’s going up to the temple in the morning to make sure the seals are still holding.”

“Is he crazy? He’ll be killed!”

“Did you hear Mikasa? If we don’t do something fast, we’ll have more to worry about than just a little earthquake.”

Jean sat quietly in the ground, wondering what the villagers would do if they knew he was the one who had set their mountain god off. That night, he had restless dreams, and woke up the next day to frantic voices gathering in the square above.

“They’re talking about a human sacrifice.”

Jean froze.

“Why? He never asked for humans before!”

“We were just lucky. I hear the other villages have been doing human sacrifices for ages.”

“It’s true; the goddess Ymir demands a sacrifice several times a year.”

“No, no, didn’t you hear? They got a new priestess and now Ymir doesn’t ask for any offerings at all.”

Jean’s attention switched to a different group of voices.

“Why does Eren want sacrifices all of the sudden?”

“He’s doesn’t; apparently it’s the council’s decision. There’s a rumor going around that one of the fruit platters had a bite taken out of it.”

“Don’t look at me!”

“Easy there guys. Sasha was with the hunting group during the ceremony, remember?”

“Well, at least none of us have to be sacrificed.”

“Talk about good timing! If we hadn’t found that dumbass in a tree yesterday-“

The bars to the cell creaked open, and the silhouette above Jean said, “Get out.”

Jean didn’t move.

“Mikasa,” a second silhouette joined the first above Jean. “Is everything else ready?”

Two strong hands scooped under Jean’s armpits and pulled him out before he could fight them off. The girl let go, and Jean was startled out of any attempts to fight as soon as he saw the rich onyx hair framing her face. He opened his mouth to say something, like maybe “please don’t make me a sacrifice” would have been appropriate, or even “damn girl let’s make out” as a last request, but Jean was having trouble making his tongue move.

Mikasa ignored his flapping mouth and turned to the person beside to her. This must have been Armin, the temple priest everyone was talking about, because he was carrying a twisty wooden staff that clattered with strings of precious stones and beads as he stepped closer to Jean. His clothes were weathered and the top of his head barely reached Jean’s chin, but his golden air was cut sharply into a perfect line just above his shoulders.

Jean was starting to hate this country. It seemed that everywhere he went, he kept meeting these people who confused the fuck out of his treasure-radar with their god-like beauty. Oh wait, one of them had turned out to be an actual god. Even better.

Armin lifted a bowl of red paint and said, “Sorry, but you’re going to have to take off your shirt.”

Jean had two choices: 1. Certain death by the psycho/gorgeous villagers or 2. _Almost_ certain death by an angsty teenager with a growth problem. He decided to go with the second option, figuring he could try and escape like before.

Or not. They snapped his ankles into a pair of silver shackles joined together by a long silver chain. They did the same to his wrists, and before Jean could blow a goodbye kiss to the onyx-haired angel, he was whisked away in a procession up the mountain.

So up the steep stairs he clanked, wearing nothing but a cloth around his waist, a silver shackle for each limb, and a flat, heavy necklace that lay mockingly against his bare chest. Armin had drawn strange red symbols all over his skin, but Jean thought the one on his stomach looked suspiciously like a pat of butter.

Jean would have run straight out of this country if it hadn’t been for the parades of people carrying food and treasure on both sides of him. He had no choice now except to keep marching up, and up, and up, dreading how Eren would react when the cause of his temper tantrum returned to the scene of the crime.

All too soon, Jean saw what was left of the many crooked roofs of the temple, cracked where trees and animals had pushed through. It looked as if the only thing holding the structure together was the series of wild vines that twisted along mosaic floors and up carved walls. Everyone went quiet, and Jean held his breath as they came to the archway covered in white parchment.

He could see now that a series of symbols had been carefully drawn on each slip. These were the seals keeping Eren inside, and before yesterday, Jean probably would have rolled his eyes at stupid things like spells and gods.

The villagers hastily set shining trays full of apples, chocolates, and meats just inside the archway. Someone set a folded piece of cloth alongside the trays, and then Armin shoved Jean forward. He tripped over the cloth and landed on his face, sneezing the dust from his nose.

“What the hell is _that_ doing here?” Eren’s voice rang out from the darkness, bitter and booming. Jean looked up and recognized the two orbs of jade glinting cat-like at the end of the dark passage. He looked exhausted, and was completely naked except for the same ornate headpiece he had been wearing the day before. A small silver necklace glinted off his chest, something Jean had not noticed during their first encounter.

A man from the village stepped forward and cleared his throat, unfolding a large piece of parchment. “Our sincerest apologies,” he read aloud, “for the insufficient sacrifice at the spring ceremony. We meant no disrespect, oh great and powerful mountain god. To make up for our negligence, we humbly offer a wider variety of meats, along with the finest human sacrifice available to us lowly creatures.”

Eren stared at Jean. “The… finest?”

“It is with deep gratitude,” the man continued, “that we thank you for the warning bestowed upon us yesterday, and from now on we will gladly offer sacrifices every spring from this point on.”

“But I don’t want it,” said Eren.

Armin stepped forward, his beads and pebbles clattering wisely. “Does a traditional offering not please you?” he asked.

“What am I supposed to do with it?” Eren spat.

“What the other mountain gods do,” said Armin. “Eat him. Or, if you prefer, kill him and then eat him.”

The horrified disgust on Eren’s face was almost comical, but Jean found the expression to be deeply insulting instead.

“What! Ew!” Eren shouted. A soft sniffling could be heard from Jean.

“At least try him,” Armin said, exasperated. “We don’t know what else to do! What do you want from us?”

“I want you to let me out!” shouted Eren, his voice bouncing between stone walls. He ran forward, his eyes full of green fire. The villagers hurried back, keeping the distance between them and Eren the same. The only person who didn’t back away was Armin, and Jean was too busy struggling to stand to move in any direction at all.

Eren jumped over Jean’s head and slammed into an invisible barrier, his hands raised as if to smash Armin’s skull in. With Eren’s back facing him, Jean could see a strange marking on the back of his neck.

Armin watched Eren carefully. “That anger needs to be contained,” he said, in an I-told-you-so sort of way. “The human sacrifice is to prevent you from shaking the mountain down. By accepting, you as a mountain god are bound to peace until the next offering is due in spring.”

Eren spun around and seized Jean.

“No thank you!” Eren said, shoving Jean back through the archway, but Jean hit the same invisible barrier.

“Ow, ow! Stop it!” Jean snarled, his face squishing against solid air.

“Take it back, I don’t accept!” shouted Eren.

Armin put his staff down on the steps with finality. “The trade has been made and the spell is set. Even if you don’t eat him, as long as he’s within the barrier you will be unable to shift.”

“Cheaters!” Eren roared.

“Stop pushing, you’ll ruin my face!” yelped Jean.

Eren dropped him and turned to kick one of the platters of fruit. It shot past the barrier and clanked down the steps, and Jean watched in confusion. Why could the plate pass through, but he suddenly couldn’t?

“If you’re not going to eat him, you might want to save some of that food for him,” said Armin. “But you might just want to eat him and save the trouble.”

Eren grit his teeth. “I’m not going to eat him.”

“Then use him as a slave,” Armin suggested. He turned away and disappeared with the group of villagers down the mountainside. Jean lifted a hand to the barrier and pushed.

“Don’t bother,” said Eren. “There’s a spell bonded to the silver.”

Jean looked down at the shackles resentfully. “We could break them off?” he suggested.

“Impossible,” said Eren, motioning to his necklace. He went over to the folded cloth and stepped into it, pulling the tunic on.

“So,” said Jean, after a moment. “You’re not going to eat me?”

A tray of chocolate came flying at him, and Jean shielded his face with his arms. The tray clanged loudly against his shackles and then fell to the floor, stacks of chocolate raining down after it.

As Eren fumed away deeper into the temple, the symbol behind his neck seemed to glow in the darkness. Jean turned back to the world outside and reached out his hand, but the barrier was as solid as ever.

“What a dick,” Jean muttered, dropping his hand. Whether he was thinking of Eren or Armin, even he wasn’t sure. Probably both, he decided, and bit into a piece of chocolate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed it! I would love to hear what you think, either here or on [tumblr](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/ask).
> 
> Thank you for reading :D


	2. Attack on Jean

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 2 of JTES is also posted [here](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/post/82642210497/jeans-treasure-erens-slave-part-2).

Jean spent the next five days looking for a way out. Eren let him look, but he didn’t join, knowing the search would be fruitless. The seals didn’t just create a barrier over the front door; the spell wound tightly like an invisible cloth around the perimeter of the temple, covering every window, door, crack, and hole leading up, down, and out.

On the sixth day, Eren heard a crash from the temple’s main entrance. A frightened lizard scampered in, saw Eren sitting on the windowsill, and skittered up his leg.

“What’s going on?” Eren asked, rubbing a knuckle under its purple chin to calm it.

“It ssseems your new ssslave is thhhrowing a tantrum,” said Lizard.

Eren frowned at it. “He’s not my slave.”

“Well whatever he isss, he’s wassting all the good food.”

“Lizards don’t need chocolate,” said Eren.

“Doessn’t mean lisssards don’t _want_ chocolate.”

Eren sighed, deciding to get up and salvage what he could of the offering. He found Jean throwing salted fish through the barrier and shouting nonsensically. Sunlight slanted in through the entrance, lighting the front passage and glittering blue off the floor beneath rubble and dirt.

“What are you doing?”

“AH!” Jean shouted and threw a fish at Eren.

“What the hell?” Eren yelled.

Jean was frozen in horror at hitting a real-life god in the chest with a fish. Eren picked up the fish and threw it back to snap him out of it. It slapped Jean right under his eye.

“Ow!” Jean lifted his hand to his face. “You hit me!” he said.

“You hit me first,” said Eren.

Jean grew furiously red and lifted the whole platter of fish over his head.

“Don’t you dare,” said Eren, but it was too late. Jean was already pitching the platter towards Eren’s head, and gravity took over, spilling the platter and its contents over Eren’s head.

Eren lunged through the salty avalanche at Jean, tackling him to the ground. Apples and grapes rolled and bounced in every direction, ricocheting against roots jutting up through the mosaic tiles. Eren’s knuckle made contact with Jean’s jaw, and Jean roared angrily, spinning them around. He managed to get on top of Eren, but was met with a knee to his stomach and found himself under Eren once again.

Eren’s jade eyes glinted, and the pearls lining his mouth flashed. Jean held his breath, pulling his mind back to the bigger picture just as a second punch was soaring toward his nose. He moved his head to the side just in time and heard something crack.

Eren froze. Jean took the opportunity to pull Eren’s wrist and push his foot against Eren’s knee, and Eren grunted when he was swept under Jean for a second time.

“Ha!” said Jean. “You don’t have to look so shocked. I know how to fight.”

Eren looked at him, panicked. “Get off.”

“Oh, okay,” Jean said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

Eren started wiggling desperately. “I mean it! _Move!_ ” But Jean just laughed victoriously.

A bee detached from the wall and buzzed lazily over to Jean, settling down on his neck. Then, it brought up its rear and swung it back down, sticking Jean hard.

“Ouch! What the-“ Jean slapped his hand to his throbbing neck where the bee had stung him. The bee whizzed away, and Eren scrambled out from under Jean and tried to run. Jean swung his legs under Eren’s bare feet, and Eren landed hard, cradling his hand against his chest. His knuckles were bleeding, and Jean spotted more blood on the cracked tiles.

“Shit! Stop it, I’m trying to save you!” Eren said.

“Save me? You were trying to run away, you coward!”

Eren got to his knees and yelled at Jean. “I shift when I bleed!”

Jean faltered. “But last time-“

“You punched me, remember? Now run!”

Jean remembered the bloody nose and stepped back. “Oh shit,” he breathed.

“ _Run!_ ” Eren’s voice ripped from his throat urgently. But Jean was frozen to the ground in fear, watching the jade in his eyes well up in tears.

The two stayed where they were, breathing hard. A moment passed, and then another. Eren looked down at where his hand was healing, shocked.

“I’m healing without shifting,” he whispered.

“What?” Jean asked, his voice coming out as a whisper as well.

“It worked.”

“What worked?”

“The offering,” Eren said. “The last one they gave me was bullshit, so when you punched me I shifted. I guess this time it worked.”

“Hold on a second,” Jean said, raising his voice. He was a little pissed that Eren had scared him for nothing. “I thought we couldn’t get out of here because of me. You’re saying you can’t turn into a… whatever that thing was, because of me too?”

“No. The spell in the silver keeps us here, not you,” Eren said. “Trust me, if you were the only thing keeping the barrier up, I would kill you.”

“Then they offered me to you just to keep you tiny?” Jean asked. “What a waste of me.”

Eren rolled his eyes. “The offerings are part of this ancient deal that keeps me from shifting and ruining the mountain. But you’re even more of a bullshit offering than last time so I thought it wouldn’t work.”

Jean made an injured noise. “They said I was the highest offering they could afford!”

“Uh, yeah,” Eren said, looking him up and down. “Because they’re poor as shit.”

“So just to clarify,” Jean said slowly. “You can’t shift anymore, right?”

“Not until next spring,” said Eren.

“Good,” Jean said, and he threw a fist at Eren’s face.

Eren mirrored the action, and felt the wetness of Jean’s eye against his own knuckles. The two let out animalistic growls, colliding and taking turns pinning each other against the walls. Bugs flew around their heads nervously, trying to bite and sting Jean but accidentally nailing Eren as well.

Eventually Jean got Eren under his arm in a headlock. He said, close to Eren’s ear, “If I beat you, will you let me out of here?”

“It doesn’t work like that,” Eren said, and elbowed Jean in the stomach. Jean released Eren and found himself bent over, his arms twisting behind his back.

“Okay, okay!” Jean cried. “If I let you beat me up, then will you let me out?”

“I can’t, stupid! And you’re not supposed change a deal just because you’re losing.”

Jean smashed his head back into Eren’s. They broke away from each other, wobbling breathlessly. Lizard was back, and she dropped from the ceiling and landed on Eren’s shoulder.

“He’sss going ttthhrough the sstagess of grief,” she said. “Ssstage thhree: Bargaining.”

“What is he grieving?” Eren asked.

“Hisss freedom, probably.”

Eren scoffed. “How dramatic of him.”

“…What?” Jean asked, staring at Eren uneasily.

“I said, ‘How dramatic of you.’”

“No you didn’t. You were sticking your tongue out and thhsssthh-ing.”

“That’s because I was talking to Lizard.”

“Because you were… talking to a lizard,” Jean repeated. A look of understanding came over him, and he shuffled farther away. Jean had no problem fighting a powerless god, but a _crazy_ powerless god was a whole different story.

“He’sss an idiot,” observed Lizard. “Tell him I tthhink he’ss an idiot.”

“She thinks you are an idiot,” Eren told Jean.

“Great,” Jean said hopelessly, his shoulders drooping. “Not only am I trapped in a temple with limited food supplies and no clothes other than this stupid rag hiding my junk, but now my only company is an angsty teenager who thinks he can talk to reptiles!”

“You’re the teenager here. I’m like, centuries old.”

Jean wasn’t listening. “He just _had_ to be crazy,” he mumbled to no one, dragging his feet down the hall. Eren heard him muttering to himself into the next room, and then the next, until his words muffled into pitiful sobs.

“Ssstage four: Depresssion,” said Lizard, shaking her little purple head solemnly.

He found Jean in the room where they first met, curled up in a pile of treasure.

“I wasn’t done fighting you,” said Eren.

Jean grunted.

“Get up,” said Eren.

“No.”

“You’re depressed.”

“Go away,” Jean croaked.

Eren left and came back, throwing him the trousers and a jacket he usually wore in the fall. “There. Some clothes.”

“They smell.”

“Be thankful.”

Jean didn’t respond. Eren couldn’t think of anything else to say, and he really didn’t feel like continuing their fight anymore, so he left Jean to wallow.

After watching the sunset from his favorite west-facing window, Eren added the 255,463rd tally to the wall, and then went down the spiral steps and through the temple where Jean was still moping in the center room.

“Are you done being depressed yet?” he asked.

Jean didn’t answer. He was facing the corner away from Eren, using the pile of clothes as a pillow.

“You’re boring,” said Eren.

When Jean still didn’t respond, Eren figured he was asleep. He sighed and went to climb the steps at the end of the room, pulling himself up onto his pedestal and curling up to sleep as well.

The next morning, Jean shuffled into the front passage with a growling stomach. He saw the white seals flapping their corners in the breeze, kindly reminding Jean of his captivity. Then he rubbed his eyes, wondering if he was still dreaming.

In the dusty sunlight, Eren was busy organizing the food from the offering. He squeaked and oinked to a pair of spotted pigs, which squealed in reply and pushed a stack of empty silver trays past Jean into the next room.

“You done moping?” Eren asked, noticing Jean was wearing the trousers and shirt.

“I’m hungry,” Jean said, rather defensively.

“The apples are still edible.”

Jean, convincing himself that the pigs were just an early-morning hallucination, bent over to pick up an apple and was promptly proven wrong. A sound like rain pattering onto stone met his ears, and he recoiled with his breakfast in hand as a pack of squirrels rushed up the steps into the temple. Their beady eyes glanced at him curiously and then clicked high-pitched morning greetings in Eren’s direction, and Eren laughed and clicked back. The pigs came back and oinked through the pack of squirrels, as if joining the greetings as well.

Jean watched, horrified. “You can talk to animals,” he said, more to himself than to Eren.

“Either that, or I’m crazy,” said Eren, repeating Jean’s accusation from the day before. He hummed and started picking up loose rubble that had fallen during his tantrum, and the squirrels got to work sweeping the floor with their bushy tales.

“What is this, Cinderella?” Jean mumbled and sat down on his heels, staring gloomily at his apple.

“If you’re not going to eat it, I will,” Eren said over the chorus of squeaks and clicks.

Jean looked up, confused. “You eat?”

“What did you think the offerings were for?”

Jean looked at the food being separated into piles.

“I just thought… I don’t know, I assumed you were immortal.”

“I am. But I’m not invincible.”

Jean bit into his apple thoughtfully. “Sho wud do you do when da oferringsh run oud?” he asked with his mouth full.

“I eat berries and nuts and stuff,” said Eren. “I have a lot of help.”

Jean nodded, trying to soak all this in.

“When you’re done eating, help me roll that rock through the barrier,” Eren said, nodding to a chunk of ceiling that had fallen near the entrance.

“No.”

Eren stopped, his arms full of ceiling bits and pebbles. “No?”

“No,” Jean repeated.

“What are you gonna do? Just stand there?”

“Pretty much,” Jean said, leaning back against the wall. Eren shook his head, troubled.

“No, Jean, you have to do something.”

“No, Eren, I don’t,” Jean replied, biting his apple rebelliously.

Eren bristled at Jean’s mocking tone. “Clean,” he ordered him.

“Why? Because I’m your slave?”

“No,” Eren said quickly. “You aren’t my slave.”

“Then don’t order me around.”

“I’m just trying to keep you from going insane!”

“Oh, because cleaning _definitely_ kept you from going off the deep end.”

“Fine, go crazy,” said Eren. “But don’t come crying to me when you start dying of boredom.”

“Whatever,” Jean said, taking a final bite of his apple and tossing it at Eren’s feet. He started walking out of the passage when the apple core came flying back at him and exploded off the back of his head.

“At least clean up after yourself!” Eren yelled after him.

Jean turned and saw that the squirrels had stopped sweeping. They stared up at him with pitch-black eyes, and Eren stood fuming above them.

“What’s the big deal? I was just contributing to your therapy,” Jean said.

“Why are you so fucking annoying?” Eren shouted.

“Me? What about you?” Jean shot back. “You nag worse than my mother!”

“At least you have a mother!”

“Oh, boo-hoo. And leave my mother out of this!”

“I wasn’t even insulting her!”

Jean didn’t know what it was about Eren, but it was something in his eyes, or maybe his teeth, or maybe his tanned skin that made Jean so angry he couldn’t think straight. His arguments weren’t even making sense anymore.

“Fuck,” Jean said. He couldn’t think of a comeback, so he moved on, “Why should I have to help clean? I wasn’t the one who made the mess!”

Jade jewels blinked incredulously. “Are you shitting me?” Eren asked. “It’s your fault I shifted in the first place!”

“Don’t blame your anger management issues on me,” said Jean.

Eren glowered from beneath the rich brown locks falling free from his headpiece. Jean wanted to grab the strands of hair and pull them out.

“I refuse to call you my slave,” Eren said, his voice low and dangerous, “but you might want to start cooperating, considering I’m the one who can get you food once the offering runs out. And come spring, I’ll be able to grow big enough to eat you whole. But only if I don’t strangle you with my bare hands before that.”

Jean refused to feel threatened. “And until spring,” he countered Eren, “you are just a normal, non-invincible teenage boy. A god with no powers is not a god at all. _I_ could strangle _you_ if I really wanted to.”

A spotted pig stepped in front of Eren and snarled. Jean snarled back, and then felt quite stupid, so he turned and stomped out angrily. He didn’t want to lower himself even more to Eren’s animalistic level. He returned to his corner in the main room of the temple and tried to plan his escape, ignoring the hateful eyes watching him from every window, nest, and hole in the wall.

Eren found he was enjoying Jean’s stubbornness immensely.

“You can tease him as much as you want,” he told the critters. “Just don’t kill him. Okay?”

“You heard the boss!” cried Lizard. “Get to work!”

The insects held a conference in the water closet.

“This is war!” hollered Ladybug. “We may be small, but we are many!”

The beetles cheered in agreement. “Go big or go home!”

“I’m sure he hates spiders,” Ladybug said to the group of eight-legged insects. “Figure out a way to scare him so bad he shits himself.”

“That won’t be hard,” said Black Widow sadly. “Everyone hates spiders.”

Meanwhile, the birds were holding a similar meeting around the fountain in the east room. “Don’t shoot until you see the whites of his eyes,” cooed an innocent-looking dove, which was not so innocent. “And remembered- lot’s of berries. They’ll make you poop worse than Chinese food.”

The pigs oinked on the front steps. “Someone go find Bob. He’s the heaviest.”

And the all-out war between Jean and every animal, insect, bird, and reptile inhabiting the temple began.

That night, Jean couldn’t sleep. Every time he would lie down, the foreboding rattle of a snake or an angry pair of pincers would be waiting for him. He glared at Eren snoring peacefully on his pedestal (though it looked uncomfortable as fuck) and tried to find a new place to sleep.

He went to the west side of the temple and discovered a spiral staircase leading up to a mysterious second floor. But Jean encountered a vibrating beehive halfway up and was chased back down, hollering through the temple for Eren to call off the swarming attack.

Eren awoke, his back cracking painfully. Jean ran into the room, wide-eyed and moving so fast that his legs were out in front of him.

“Help!” he cried.

Eren buzzed sleepily to the black cloud of bees pushing through the archway. The bees hummed back, clearly not ready to quit. Eren shot them a look and they lowered down slightly, before drifting dejectedly out of the room.

“Whew, thanks,” Jean said, but Eren shot him the same disapproving look he had given the bees.

“They said you were snooping,” he said.

“What! I wasn’t snooping, I was looking for a place to sleep!”

“What’s wrong with your corner?” Eren asked, suddenly looking worried. “Is it me?”

“No, it has nothing to do with you,” Jean said.

“Do I sleep talk? Shit, I always thought I might be a talker, but no one’s ever been able to tell me-“

“No, shut up for two seconds, okay? I said it’s not you. It’s those stupid beetles and snakes keeping me awake.”

“Well I’d pinch and rattle you awake too if you called me stupid.”

“They were doing it before I called them stupid!”

“What do you want me to do about it?”

“Tell them to stop!”

“I can’t control them,” Eren said.

“Yes you can, you just did it with the bees.”

“I had a conversation with them. They decided to listen.”

“Well then _have a conversation_ with the snakes and beetles,” said Jean.

Eren sighed. He winced and hopped off his pedestal, then approached the pile of treasure in the corner that was Jean’s bed.

He crouched down and hissed quietly. A snake slithered out from a mountain of coins and rattled in reply. Eren laughed.

“What?”

“Oh, nothing, nothing,” Eren hummed.

“I hate being left out,” Jean muttered.

“Well I hate being woken up in the middle of the night to play peacemaker,” said Eren. “Come over here.”

Jean grumbled and went to stand by Eren.

“Apologize,” said Eren.

“Apologize for what?” Jean asked. “They started it!”

“They said you started it.”

“And you believe them?”

“You want me to believe you? I don’t even know you,” said Eren.

Jean ground his teeth together. “Well apparently you don’t know them as well as you think you do.”

“Just apologize,” said Eren, looking exhausted.

Jean glared down at the snakes and beetles climbing out from behind jewels and coins. They stared up at him, and Jean swore they were all wearing smiles of pure evil.

“No,” he said. “Never.”

Eren shrugged. “Suit yourself,” he said, and went back to fall asleep on his pedestal.

Jean soon became sleep deprived. He sat in the room that lead to the water closet, staring down at his reflection in the whitewashed fountain. The dark circles under his eyes were so dark, he wondered if they would ever fully go away.

“Vain much?” asked Eren on his way to the water closet.

Jean jumped. “God damn it, stop sneaking up on me!”

“I’m not sneaking up on you.”

“You walk like a freaking cat.”

Eren stopped. “What’s a cat?”

“Something that walks really quietly.”

“Oh,” Eren said, pleased with this answer.

 _Splat_. Jean looked at his shoulder and found a white glob dribbling down his shirt.

“What the-“

_Splat. Splat._

A dove and two blue jays cooed and chirped cheerfully down from a beam running across the ceiling. Jean heard a muffled laugh come from the water closet.

“Eren!”

“It wasn’t me,” came Eren’s voice. “I’m shitting where I’m supposed to.”

“Shoo, you little fuckers,” Jean said, standing up and waving his arms around.

“That’s just going to make them-“

_Splat splat splat._

“-angrier,” said Eren.

Jean swore and threw his arms up over his head. He ran for the main room, where an army was waiting for him, tails up.

Jean dove through the bird bombs, finding a large silver platter to use as a shield. He snapped a branch off of one of the old trees growing through the temple walls and swung it around wildly.

“Give him all you got, fellas!” shouted Dove. Jean heard the order as a bird twittering loudly, but somehow the message got across. He knew he was about to enter hell.

The next hour was a blur. Jean couldn’t make it from one side of the temple to the other without being shat on by a hundred birds. He was covered in bird poop by the time he figured out the birds didn’t dare tarnish Eren’s pedestal. He climbed onto it, laughing hysterically. The birds cooed and twittered undoubtedly rude things down at Jean, and then decided to dive-bomb him as a last resort.

“No fair!” Jean shouted, dropping the branch in favor of kicking and punching the birds away.

A shrill whistle broke through the chaos, and the birds suddenly cleared off. Jean saw Eren standing in the middle of the room, looking around the feather-and-shit-covered treasure.

Jean was sure Eren was about to be furious. He stood tall on the pedestal, ready to fight. But Eren smiled at the treasure and chirped to the birds, and then looked up at Jean.

“Too bad,” he said. “All your glorious treasure is ruined.”

Jean was pissed. He wasn’t exactly sure what he was pissed about, besides having two inches of bird poop crusting over his skin and clothes, but he jumped down and shoved past Eren. He stomped back to the room with the fountain and started taking his clothes off.

“What’s this?” Eren asked, leaning smugly up against the frame of the archway.

“I’m taking a ba- a swim.”

“A swim?”

“Yes,” Jean said carefully. “This is simply a swim.”

“Not a bath?”

“Not a bath. No cleaning, just swimming.”

“Hm,” Eren said, watching Jean wiggle out of his trousers.

“…Do you mind?”

“Not at all,” said Eren, motioning to the fountain.

“Not watching,” Jean clarified, frustrated at Eren’s constant naivety. “I meant do you mind not watching.”

“Oh!” Eren said quickly. “Right. Privacy and all that. Then, right. Okay.”

Jean watched him run off and let out a long breath.

“Even if he isn’t crazy,” he thought aloud, “he sure is awkward as fuck.”

 _Splat_.

Jean fell asleep immediately after his “swim”. Exhausted and fed up, he decided to push the treasure into a sort of nest around him so he could sleep on the bare floor, free from rattle snakes and beetles.

But despite his best efforts to stay asleep, Jean awoke to find the sun had already set, and Eren’s soft snoring signaled to him that morning was still a long way off.

He sat up- or at least, he tried to sit up but something was weighing him down. As his eyes adjusted dizzily to the darkness, he realized what had woken him up. A great boar, even bigger than he was, stared down at Jean with old, droopy eyes.

Jean tried to call for help, but his voice came out in a raspy breath. He couldn’t breathe.

“Ah,” said the boar. “Sorry. I always forget how heavy I am.”

The weight shifted, and Jean gasped, filling his lungs with the cold night air. Jean was in such shock at a boar actually talking to him that he forgot how to use his own voice, so he settled for staring at it dumbly. Then, he laughed and laid back down.

“This isn’t a dream,” said the boar, stomping a hoof on Jean’s stomach.

“Ah!” Jean yelped, sitting up again. It definitely wasn’t a dream after all.

“I’m Bob,” said the boar. “A pair of pigs told me about you. Told me to frighten you to death.”

“Oh,” said Jean. He looked over at Eren for assistance, but he was still curled up awkwardly on the pedestal, fast asleep.

“Relax, kid. The ‘to death’ part was just an exaggeration,” said Bob.

Jean turned back to the boar and asked, “Why can I hear you? I can’t hear any of the other animals.”

“That’s because I’m old. Even older than the young mountain god over there. I’ve had a long time to learn the languages humans use. But enough about me, I want to know about you.”

“Um,” Jean struggled to keep up. “About me?”

“Yes, yes, tell me: What’s your name? Why are you here? What are your hobbies?”

“Is this a test?”

The boar stomped his hoof angrily on Jean’s stomach again.

“Ouch! Okay, okay! I’m Jean. I, uh, I’m here because I was supposed to be sacrificed?”

“No, no, before that. Why did you come here in the first place?”

Jean didn’t like where this was headed. “Because I heard stories.”

“About?”

“About old temples.”

“And?”

“…And treasure.”

“Ah,” said the boar. “And you came here to steal from these old abandoned temples, yes?”

“….”

“I’ll take your silence as confirmation. But why did you do it?”

“To get rich, obviously.”

“Why?”

“Because everyone wants to be rich.”

“Why?”

Jean nearly pulled his own hair out. “I don’t know! Why are you asking me so many questions?”

“Because I’m fond of Eren. He’s one of the only mountain gods left who won’t eat humans. Now, moving on: What are your hobbies?”

“What is this, a date?”

“The faster you answer the questions, the sooner you’ll get to go back to sleep.”

“Ugh, fine. I don’t have any hobbies.”

“Everyone has a hobby.”

“Well I don’t,” said Jean. “Unless looking for treasure counts.”

“That definitely counts,” said the boar.

“Great. Can I go to sleep now?”

“One more question,” said the boar, ignoring Jean’s groan as he continued, “How did Eren react to you stealing his treasure?”

Jean could tell that this was the thing Bob really wanted to know. But Jean frowned, because having your things stolen was usually followed by a pretty standard reaction. “Well he was pissed, obviously.”

“Hm,” the old boar said. He looked around at all the treasure littered across the room. “It’s strange to get angry over something you obviously care nothing about.”

“I’m pretty sure he cares a lot about his gold.”

“Does he?” asked the boar. “Ah, sorry, that was two questions. I’ll let you sleep now.”

Before Jean could respond, the boar brought it’s head down heavily against Jean’s. Jean saw stars and felt himself falling backwards, down into the deepest sleep he’d had in weeks.

When he opened his eyes again, daylight was streaming in through the sagging roof above his head. He sat up and rubbed the bump on his head, validating that the boar named Bob had not been a strange dream.

“You look like shit,” Eren’s voice called over to him. He was yawning atop the pedestal and adjusting his headpiece, the sunlight once again cascading beautifully down his bronzed skin and slightly see-through tunic.

Clearly still half asleep, Jean gave himself a slap.

“Is that some kind of morning ritual?” Eren asked.

“Yes,” Jean said firmly. He tried not to laugh when Eren tried it.

“Well,” Eren said decidedly. “That’s a stupid ritual.”

“For stupid people,” said Jean, and then he looked around. “Yuck. Looks like you have a lot of cleaning to do today.”

Eren barely glanced at the piles of treasure crusted-over with bird poop. “Not really.”

Jean turned all his attention on Eren. “What? But it’s a disaster!”

“It was a disaster even before you came and ruined my temple.”

“Eren. It’s covered in bird shit.”

Eren shrugged, trying to make it seem like it was no big deal. What the boar said the night before seemed extremely relevant to their current situation.

“Don’t you care about it?” he asked Eren, echoing Bob’s words.

Eren looked annoyed. “It’s not that I don’t care.”

“What it is, then?”

Eren looked even more annoyed. “It’s just… a lot of work?”

“Then I’ll help,” said Jean, giving up his no-cleaning rule in favor of aggravating Eren.

“I’m not going to clean it,” Eren said firmly.

“Then I’ll do it alone,” said Jean stubbornly.

Eren was clearly not expecting this. Jean hadn’t really expected to volunteer either, but he was too caught up in pushing Eren’s buttons to care.

“Fine,” said Eren.

“Fine,” said Jean.

Eren glared at Jean for another moment, but Jean didn’t back down. Finally, Eren slid off the pedestal and wove through the crusty treasure to the west side of the room.

“Where are you going?” asked Jean.

“None of your business.”

Which, of course, made it very much Jean’s business to find out. He got up and followed Eren into the next room.

“I’m coming with,” he announced.

“No, you’re not,” said Eren.

“What’s your problem?” asked Jean.

“Nothing, what’s _your_ problem?” asked Eren.

“You are,” said Jean.

“Then stop following me!”

“You seriously have the weirdest mood swings,” Jean hurried along behind Eren. “First you get mad at me stealing your shit, and then you don’t fucking care even though that’s what got us into this mess in the first place!”

“I never said I didn’t care,” said Eren, rushing down the hallway towards the spiral staircase.

“You really are just a fucking hormonal brat, you know that?” Jean said. “If it weren’t for you, I’d be free as a fucking bird right now. Instead, I’m stuck here with you, getting shit on and harassed by your stupid forest friends!”

Eren climbed the spiral staircase with Jean hot on his heels.

“Stop following me!” Eren shouted.

“Stop trying to be mysterious!” Jean shouted back.

Eren whirled around, and Jean almost fell backwards down the steps.

“Then stop trying to figure me out,” Eren said. “Bzztt zzbt!”

An angry buzzing started from the beehive above Jean’s head. Jean’s mouth fell open, seeing the same angry beehive that had driven him from the second floor last time.

“Are you threatening me?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Eren. “You are trespassing. Turn around.”

“What are you hiding?”

The buzzing got louder.

“Nothing.”

“Yes you are!”

“Leave me alone!” Eren bellowed.

The bees burst out of the hive and took over the stairwell. Jean stumbled backward covered his face, but not before seeing Eren’s back retreating up around the stairs and out of sight.

“Coward!” Jean called after him. A bee stung him in the shin, and then another in the back, and Jean was forced to turn around, keeping his mouth sealed tight until he was back in the hallway at the base of the stairs.

“I’ll get up there eventually,” Jean said. “But first things first.” And he set off to clean the treasure that Eren didn’t want cleaned.

Eren didn’t come down for almost a week. Jean was busy cleaning an organizing the whole time, which totally sucked, but on the second day he found what appeared to be a golden strainer.

“Hm,” he said, setting it aside thoughtfully.

By the third day, the bird poop was practically gone, and all that was really left was organizing the piles. Squirrels left berries for Jean every morning, and he figured Eren was asking them to do it. But he was too bitter to appreciate it, since every living thing in the temple was too busy cheering Eren up that Jean was left completely alone. He wouldn’t go so far to say he was lonely, but he did feel a bit neglected- especially at night when he could hear laughter coming from the floor above.

“First you’re busy pitying yourself, and now you’re laughing your ass off,” Jean grumbled. “Make up your god damn mind.”

Six days into the Make-Eren-Cry-through-the-Power-of-Cleaning project, a huge black spider fell from the ceiling and landed on the pile of treasure right in front of Jean.

“Rawr,” said Black Widow, which turned into a tiny squeak in Jean’s ears.

Jean looked down, his eyes growing huge.

“Brilliant!” he said, and grabbed the curved platter from under Black Widow. All eight legs were whisked out from under her, and as she tumbled down the pile, her heart tumbled right into love.

“He isn’t afraid of spiders,” she told Eren when she got upstairs. “I like him. A lot.”

Eren let out a heavy sigh and turned from the darkening window. He walked to the wall and scratched in the 255,481st tally.

“Well I hate him,” he said, stepping back and looking over the tallies. “Go bother him for me.”

Lizard and Black Widow exchanged looks.

“No thanks. We’re tired,” said Lizard.

“Why don’t you go bother him instead?” suggested Black Widow.

“I can’t. He hates me.”

“Doesn’t that make it easier?” asked Black Widow. “It’s much harder bothering him now that I know he likes me.”

“He doesn’t like you,” said Lizard. “I don’t think he even saw you.”

“He called me brilliant,” said Black Widow.

“I think you misunderstood,” said Lizard.

“I don’t want to bother him,” Eren cut in, rubbing his temples. “He gets on my nerves, and I don’t even know why. I mean, he’s annoying as shit, but… ugh!”

“You seem confused,” said Lizard.

“I think I’m just tired.” Eren sat up on his favorite windowsill and leaned against the wall, closing his eyes.

He jerked awake to a mighty clang echoing up the stairwell, followed by an angry buzzing of bees. Eren would have fallen straight out of the window if it hadn’t been for the barrier stretching across it, with morning light already shining in the forest beyond.

“Intruder! Intruder!” the bees were screaming. “Stop him! Stop him!”

The clanging grew closer. Eren watched the top of the stairwell in horror as something came around the bend, flashing gold and silver.

“He’s too strong!” the bees cried. “What should we do? Eren, help!”

The bees were ricocheting off the makeshift armor covering the figure that barreled into the room. Vines wrapped around two curved platters that encased the figure’s torso, and freshly cleaned golden chalices protected its hands. Both feet clanged and clomped under shining plates, and a golden strainer covered its head. The only things assuring Eren had that this was Jean and not yet another intruder were the two silver chains connecting the feet and ankles.

“HA!” Jean cried.

“Get out!” Eren shrieked, pulling his knees to his chest.

“Woah, calm down. It’s not like I caught you changing.”

“Leave!”

“Not until I find what you’re hiding!”

“I’m not hiding anything,” Eren said.

“Then stop acting so mysterious,” Jean said. “It’s pissing me off.”

“If you weren’t so nosey, it wouldn’t be a problem,” said Eren.

The bees were getting tired. “Can we stop?” they asked, sliding off the armor now.

“No!” Eren shouted.

“No what?” asked Jean.

“I wasn’t talking to you,” said Eren.

“But you were speaking human,” said Jean.

“They can understand human perfectly fine. They just can’t speak it.”

“What?” Jean looked around at all the wildlife crammed into the room. “This whole time?”

The critters nodded guiltily.

“Then fuck off, bees!” Jean said. Then he thought more about it and added, “Please?”

“Bzzzt! (Gladly!)” the bees said, retreating.

“Hey, it worked,” Jean said, laughing. Then he noticed the marks covering the walls. “Woah.”

“Shut up.”

“Are those days? Or minutes?”

“Days,” Eren said grimly.

“Shit. It looks like a prison.”

“Well I’m not staying here by choice, you know.”

“Why count it, though?” Jean asked. “It’s not like you have anything to count to.”

“I know that.”

“Then why bother?”

“It helps me keep track of time.”

“Wow.”

“Shut up.”

“No it’s just…”

“It’s what a crazy person would do, I know.”

“Well yeah, but that’s not what I-“

“Then what?”

“It’s just…”

“Just say it.”

“You,” said Jean, “are really old.

“Oh.”

“Like, _really_ old.”

“Yeah. I know.”

“Is this what you didn’t want me to see?”

“Sorta.”

“That’s stupid,” said Jean.

“Thanks. Now go away,” said Eren.

“What? But I just got up here!”

“And now you’ll go back down there.”

“No way,” Jean said, shaking his covered head back and forth. “It took me the whole night to finish putting this battle suit together.”

“I thought you were cleaning.”

“I’m done.”

“Oh.”

“So…” Jean said, not quite sure where to go from there. “Wanna come see?”

“Not really.”

“You are so difficult!” Jean said. “I’m bored out of my mind down there! Aren’t you bored?”

“Not really.”

“I guess you wouldn’t be when you have an army of entertainment,” said Jean, motioning to the onlookers.

“They aren’t entertainers,” said Eren. “They’re friends.”

“Well what did you talk about?”

“There, see?” Eren shouted. “You’re nosey!”

“I’m bored,” Jean corrected him. “Just talk to me for five minutes, and I’ll leave.”

“Really?”

“Yes! Really! Now what were you talking about?”

Eren pointed out the window. “Outside.”

“You talked about the _weather_?” Jean asked. “That’s so lame.”

“No, we talked about places.”

“Like places you want to go?” asked Jean, trying to help him along.

Eren’s eyes lit up, signaling to Jean that the mountain god had many places he wanted to go. But his excitement was brief, replaced by the most serious expression Jean had seen him wear yet.

“Can I asked you something?” he all but whispered.

“Definitely,” said Jean. This was the first conversation he’d had with someone who wasn’t his reflection in days. He would gladly answer questions about his own farts if that were what Eren wanted.

“Don’t laugh,” Eren said.

“Why would I laugh?” Jean asked.

“Because,” Eren hesitated, biting his lip. Jean’s eyes accidentally got stuck on Eren’s teeth as they sunk into the soft skin beneath his mouth. “Because I don’t even know if it’s real. I’ve only heard about it.”

 _Those are not jewels_ , Jean had to remind himself, pulling his eyes from Eren’s mouth. _Those are features on Eren’s face._

“Uh,” Jean scrambled to collect his thoughts. “What is it? Maybe I’ll know if it’s real or not.”

“The Rain Forest.”

“Oh,” Jean said, pleased. “That’s it?”

“You’re laughing,” Eren said tensely.

“No I’m not, I’m just happy.”

“Why?”

“Because I was afraid you were going to say something like Neverland or Atlantis.”

“What-“

“Places that don’t exist,” Jean answered quickly. “But don’t worry, the rainforest exists.”

“Oh, good,” Eren said, smiling.

 _Get it together, Jean._ His eyes went down to the bracelets on Eren’s arms. _That is treasure_ , he told himself. Then he looked back up at Eren’s eyes and thought, _Not treasure._ The headpiece? _Treasure._ Delicate onyx toenails? _Not treasure._ Ruby lips? _Flesh, not rubies, you creep._

“But why would that make _you_ happy?” Eren suddenly asked him suspiciously.

Jean almost said, “Who wouldn’t be happy at a chance to make you smile?” but somewhere between his brain and his mouth, his good ol’ common sense stepped in and screamed, _Change course, Jean! Change course!_

What came out was, “Who wouldn’t be horse?”

“What?”

“Ah,” Jean said, hoping the strainer was hiding his blush. A crow cackled from the beams above, and he saw a blue jay silence it with a shove.

Jean tried again and said, “I just didn’t want to crush your dreams and then be crushed by you.”

Nailed it. Jean mentally patted himself on the back.

“I can’t crush you. At least, not until next spring,” Eren said, smirking.

“Uhhh,” Jean’s mind was shutting down again. Flirting? _Flirting_?! He doubted Eren even knew what flirting was. Eren was probably just trying to be intimidating and accidentally came off as hot… _But_ _Eren isn’t hot, Jean._

He needed to say something instead of flapping his lips like a fish, so he went back to the main topic. “Why the rainforest?” he asked.

“Honestly, anywhere is fine. But the Rain Forest is just so different, you know? It’s hard to imagine without seeing it for myself.”

“It’s not _that_ different,” Jean argued. “It’s basically the same thing as this forest, except the plants look a little weirder and the humidity’s a bitch.”

“What are you talking about? The Rain Forest isn’t made of plants,” said Eren.

“…Huh?”

“The Rain Forest is that huge puddle in the ground.”

“You mean a marsh?” Jean suggested.

“No,” Eren said, growing anxious. He hopped off the windowsill and grabbed one of Jean’s chalice-covered hands, dragging him to the stairs and down it.

“Where are we going?” Jean asked, pulling back. The chalice popped off an Eren grabbed Jean’s sweaty hand instead, letting the chalice clang down the stairs in front of them. He lead Jean under the buzzing beehive and around to the bottom of the stairs, past the chalice into the next room, and then through the archway to the main area of the temple. A couple of birds followed, and curious beetles scuttled alongside ladybugs on the walls after them.

They crossed the main room to the other side. To Jean’s disappointment, Eren didn’t acknowledge the glistening stacks of treasure organized around Jean’s corner. They stopped in the next room, where the water-filled fountain was sparkling with the reflected sunrise that blinked through eastward-facing wall.

“That,” said Eren, pointing to the water. “A forest made of raindrops. But a hundred times bigger.”

“Ohh,” said Jean. “The ocean.

“The what?”

“The ocean,” said Jean. “Or a sea, depending on the size.

Eren thought about this and then looked up. The birds on the beams ruffled their feathers.

“But the birds call it the Rain Forest,” he said.

“Yeah, well, birds are idiots.”

 _Splat_. A white glob landed on his uncovered hand, which Eren was still holding tight.

“Hey!” Jean shouted. A single cheery chirp was the response.

Jean was suddenly pulled down to sit on the fountain’s edge, next to Eren. The tray covering his butt crashed against the stone loudly.

“Agh! What’s the big idea? At least let go of my hand before you decide to sit down.”

Eren released Jean’s hand. “Well I didn’t know you were going to sit so gracelessly.”

“Well maybe if I had known you wanted me to sit-“

“I was just trying to be nice,” Eren snapped.

“Propelling someone into solid rock isn’t exactly a nice thing to do.”

“I was going to wash the shit off your hand, you asshole!”

“Why would I want someone like you touching my hand?”

“Someone like-“

Something in Eren changed. He looked at his hands, and through the strainer Jean saw all the anger and hurt and excitement of the argument vanish from his face. When he looked back at Jean, his jade eyes had gone cold.

“Sorry,” said Eren, his voice sounding strange. “I forgot.”

“Forgot what?” Jean said, slightly frightened. Eren stood up and straightened his headpiece. “Forgot what?” Jean repeated, but Eren wasn’t looking at him. He drifted out of the room, leaving Jean to stare after his eerie silhouette.

A thousand angry eyes glared at him.

“What did I do?” he asked. The purple lizard appeared on the fountain where Eren had been sitting. It looked up at Jean and shook its little head, very disappointed indeed.

Jean wanted to squish it. Instead, he got up and went after Eren, and the birds and bugs chirped and buzzed gleefully at the action. The tune came out sounding like a victory march.

“Oh shut up,” Jean said, straightening his strainer.

He clanged and clattered through the archway and saw Eren sitting on his pedestal like a statue.

“Eren,” Jean called out, making his way over to the steps noisily. Eren stayed as still as possible, staring out over Jean’s head. “Listen, I’m sorry, alright? When I said ‘someone like you’ I didn’t mean… What I meant was that you’re a moody, naïve asshole.”

Eren didn’t answer, but his gaze slid down to meet Jean’s. Jean realized this was only his second time seeing Eren on his pedestal when he wasn’t either sleeping or waking up.

“Is this what you did before I got here?” Jean asked. “Sure doesn’t look comfortable.”

“It’s not supposed to be.”

Jean stared at him. “What, so it’s some kind of punishment? Eren, get down.”

“No.”

“Quit being a kid. What happened to cleaning?”

“I ran out of things to clean,” said Eren.

Jean resisted the urge to point out the piles of treasure behind him. That was an argument for another day, and right now he was on the verge of turning a thousand tiny enemies into allies. “Come down here and wipe my hand off already,” he said, holding it out.

Eren crinkled his nose. “Gross. No.”

“What the hell? You were so eager two seconds ago!”

“I wasn’t _eager_.”

“If I tell you more about the ocean, will you come down and clean my fucking hand?”

Jean wasn’t sure why he was making it into a trade, but he felt an army of eyes telling him not to back out now.

“It’s probably all crusty,” Eren said. Jean was just about to give up when Eren slid off the pedestal, his warm fingers wrapping around Jean’s wrist just below his shackle.

“Finally,” said Jean, letting himself be pulled into the fountain room a second time. He almost expected another chorus of victory from The Birds and The Bees ( _so clever, Jean_ ), but nature had settled down to watch with quiet satisfaction.

Eren dipped Jean’s hand in the fountain.

“How long are you planning to wear this?” Eren asked.

“As long as it takes for your minions to stop attacking me,” Jean said. He tried not to look down at Eren’s perfect fingers rubbing his hand, or his long eyelashes, or the muscles moving beneath the bronzed skin of his arms…

No. It was the soft morning light that made everything seem overly romantic, that’s all. Or maybe it was the fact that Jean had been by himself for nearly a week, with no one to talk to except his own reflection as he polished expensive platters.

But that also didn’t make sense. Jean knew he had an obsession with gold and anything that sparkled. But he had been surrounded by nothing but treasure in Eren’s absence. He should have been used to beautiful things by now.

The outline of Eren’s figure was visible with the sunlight hitting him from behind, and Jean swallowed hard. The golden bracelets clanked and jangled around Eren’s delicate wrists, but Jean found himself captured by Eren’s face. Not the way his face looked, but the way it _looked_. The expressions that fell across it, the way his eyebrows settled into a concentrated furrow.

Jean stopped breathing when Eren’s eyes met his, the green jewels somehow capturing the sunlight coming from behind while the rest of his face remained in shadow.

“You gonna talk, or what?” Eren asked.

Jean forced himself to start breathing again.

“What do you,” Jean swallowed, “want to talk about?”

Eren stopped rubbing his hand and peered and Jean through his strainer. “What the hell is going on in there? Did a bee sting you in the brain?”

“I… Sorry, what?”

“You said you’d tell me about the ocean.”

“Oh, right. The ocean.” _For fuck’s sake Jean, think!_ “It’s big.”

“Duh.”

“Right. Duh. Um, it’s also blue…”

“Duh again,” said Eren. He re-dipped Jean’s hand and got back to setting little fires along Jean’s nerve-endings with his fingertips.

It took all of Jean’s concentration to think back to his hometown. He lived near the port, right on the ocean. “Sometimes it looks like the sky. Did you know that?” When Eren shook his head, Jean continued, “You can see the clouds in it, and the birds look like they’re flying upside-down… What are you doing?”

“Your skin is so pale,” Eren said, lifting Jean’s fingers to his face. Jean almost choked on his own spit when he felt Eren’s breath puff against his wrist.

“Well excuse me for being pasty,” said Jean, crossing his legs. It was difficult with the armor.

Eren ran a finger along the scar on Jean’s palm. “What’s this from?”

“I picked up a jellyfish when I was a kid.”

“Hm,” Eren said, his long eyelashes lowering. “What’s a jellyfish?”

“It’s a blobbish thing in the ocean. It kinda looks like you, actually.” He half-laughed, feeling judgmental gazes all around.

Eren’s fingers tightened. “You’ve been to the ocean?”

“My country is right on the ocean. Um, are you done with my hand?”

Eren leaned closer, curiosity blazing. “Your country? You mean you aren’t from here?”

“Obviously I’m not from here,” Jean said, momentarily forgetting his discomfort. “We don’t have gods and magic and crazy temple priests where I come from. How was I supposed to know I’d run into an actual real-life god?”

“Didn’t you hear the stories though?”

“Of course I heard stories. That’s why I’m here.”

Eren’s grip was tightening painfully, and Jean tried to stop his hands from sweating through sheer willpower.

“What did the stories say?” Eren asked.

“They talked about gold,” Jean said.

“And?” Eren was reminding Jean an awful lot of Bob the talking boar.

“I don’t really remember,” Jean chose to say. “The rest of it was just stupid superstition to keep gullible thieves away.”

“Ha!” Eren said, finally releasing Jean’s hand. “And let me guess, you don’t believe in superstition?”

“Unfortunately, no,” said Jean. “I’m not a superstitious guy, especially if it stands between me and a butt-load of treasure.

“And look where that got you,” said Eren, the corner of his mouth tugging upward.

“It got me stuck in here with you.”

Eren laughed. “Your own fault,” he said.

“I’d say it’s more your fault than mine,” Jean teased back.

“I was only kidding,” Eren said, his laughter settling into a smile. “Obviously it’s my fault.”

The conversation had turned again. “Wait, what?” Jean asked. “I was the one who was kidding.”

“No,” Eren said firmly. “I was the one at fault. Too bad my punishment was getting a lousy selfish thief for a sacrifice.”

Jean dodged the insults, determined to tackle a truth he was getting deliciously close to.

“There you go with punishments again,” said Jean, thinking of tallies and the pedestal. “Isn’t being trapped in here alone punishment enough?”

“I’m not alone.” Eren touched his headpiece self-consciously. “Even before you, I wasn’t alone.”

They were going in the wrong direction. “What did you do that was so bad?” Jean asked.

Eren shrugged. “Clearly I’m evil.”

“You’re a god.”

“They call me that now, but I’ve been called a lot of things. God, demon, monster,” Eren listed, “a stupid superstition.”

Jean winced. “You’re not stupid.”

“I didn’t even know what a jellyfish was.”

“Eren,” Jean said. “Stop being stupid.”

“You just told me I wasn’t stupid.” Eren’s voice was losing life again. Jean was losing ground.

“Just forget about the damn jellyfish and come here,” Jean said, wrapping his armored arms around Eren and pulling him close.

 _Bump_.

“Uh… Jean?”

Jean’s eyes flew open, realization hitting him like an avalanche of bird poop. The golden strainer was pressed against Eren’s confused face, and Jean panicked, confronted by the reality of what his body was trying to do.

His hands- one clean but sweaty and one still inside a chalice- shoved Eren into the fountain with a splash.

“Ahh! What the hell?” Eren yelled. “What are you doing?”

“What am I doing? What are _you_ doing!?” Jean shouted, still clenching his fists.

“Nothing! I was just minding my own business when you pressed against me!”

“Shut up!” Jean shouted, clashing up to stand and clanging heatedly toward the door. “I hate you!”

“I hate you more!”

“I hate you infinity!”

“I _am_ infinity!”

“I don’t care, you celestial asshole!” said Jean, exiting the room.

Eren roared back wordlessly.

“Good one!” Jean’s voice answered sarcastically as he clanged to his corner in the adjecent room.

Eren splashed over to the side of the fountain and got out. He went over to the window and started taking his tunic off, but then he caught Lizard grinning up at him cunningly.

“What?” he snapped.

“I think he was trying to kiss you,” said Lizard.

“Oh,” Eren said. “What’s that?”

A chorus of animals, insects, birds, and reptiles alike groaned in unison.


	3. The Birds and the Bees

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 3 of JTES is also posted [here](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/post/83953365562/jeans-treasure-erens-slave-part-3).

When he felt confident the birds and the bees were done harassing him, Jean took his makeshift armor off. He hunched in his corner, surrounded by the stacks of shining treasure he had worked so hard to polish and sort, all for the sake of Eren to ignore it.

Jean fumed. He was mad at Eren, but mostly he was mad at himself for constantly thinking about Eren. Obviously he was losing his mind! But wasn’t cleaning supposed to prevent that? Eren had said-

_Stop thinking about him!_

He looked at himself in the broken mirror propped up against the wall. He had found it during the Make-Eren-Cry-through-the-Power-of-Cleaning project, and at first he thought it was another plate until the dust was blown off and Jean could clearly see himself staring back. He saw that his hair was a little longer and his muscles were somehow toned from doing so much housework, and living off berries, nuts, and plants seemed to make Jean’s skin glow. He was still pale, not bronzed and beautiful like Eren, but his face was just as smooth and healthy. Jean sighed, looking down at the clothes Eren had given him. The leather encasing his torso was too warm for this weather, and the cotton sleeves were tattered. The fitted trousers were in even worse shape. Clearly Eren didn’t take care of himself or his belongings the same way he took care of the temple.

“Stop it, Jean,” Jean told himself, staring hard into the mirror. His eyes were nothing compared to the green-

“No,” Jean cut himself off sternly. “Don’t think about Eren’s eyes. Or how they look when he cries. Or his voice, or the way he says things without thinking…”

A little spider popped out from behind the mirror, distracting Jean from his counterproductive self-intervention. Black Widow was watching Jean smugly.

“Wait, it’s not what it sounded like,” Jean told it. The spider looked smugger than ever. “No, you don’t get it. I _hate_ him, obviously! Stop looking at me like that!”

The spider turned and squeaked at a group of beetles, and they saluted, scuttling away ominously.

“Where are they going? Ugh, nevermind. I’m just lonely, okay? I’m pretty sure I’d be attracted to a goat right now if I saw one.”

The spider blinked all eight eyes ponderingly.

“No. Don’t bring me a goat,” Jean said, rubbing his temples. “Listen, just don’t meddle in this. I’ll just… jack off or something. Relieve some tension.”

The spider shot out a silver strand and wooshed over a pile of treasure, gone.

But Jean found he couldn’t jack off. Well he could, but every time he started, he thought of Eren. And then Eren himself tiptoed through the room, knocking over a stack of plates and then bolting like a frightened deer out the westward archway. A huge flurry of wings and scuttling feet followed behind him, the animals throwing Jean glances before leaving to do who knows what upstairs (probably throw another party without him). So Jean gave up choking the chicken early, hating himself more than ever for be so preoccupied with such an annoying dumbass, and then ended up falling asleep in front of the mirror after staring angrily at the lump in his pants until it went away.

Meanwhile, up in his favorite room, Eren was pacing distractedly.

“What was that all about?” he spat. “He’s such a jerk!”

“I like him,” said a blue jay.

“I _know_ you all suddenly like him!” Eren said, pulling the headpiece off his head to a run hand through his hair. “If you like him so much, why don’t you go… do whatever it is you do!”

The animals looked around at one another, concerned.

“Eren,” said a blue jay. “I think it’s time we had… _the talk_.”

Lizard hissed. “What? It’sss too sssoon!”

“It’s been centuries,” said the blue jay. “Just because no one before us wanted to tell him doesn’t mean he can’t know ever. Someone has to do it.”

“Let sssomeone elssse do it next ssentury,” said Lizard.

“What are you talking about?” asked Eren.

“He needs to know now,” said another blue jay. “You saw the hormonal beast attacking him just now. Eren needs to be prepared.”

Eren put the headpiece back on and sat in the middle of the floor. “Prepared for what?” he asked.

And so it began.

Eren stared, horrified, as the blue jays described “copulation”. He watched in amazement when the bees used flowers to explain the different ways of having sex. And by the time a praying mantis had finished retelling his close encounter with death after meeting a female praying mantis, Eren was clutching Lizard to his chest so tight she thought she might be smooshed into grape jelly.

“What does all this have to do with me?” asked Eren.

“Because we think Jean’s getting… restless, if you know what I mean,” said the blue jay.

Eren shifted, flustered. “But Jean’s not a girl,” he said.

“So?” asked Ladybug.

“ _So_ ,” Eren started, “There’s no way we can even, you know, _mate!_ ”

“Mating and making love are two different things,” said Ladybug. “Mating is simply an action that leads to multiplication. Do you want to multiply?”

Eren pictured the temple packed with little mountain gods and grimaced. “Not really.”

“Exactly!” said Ladybug loudly. “And even if you did, there’s this thing called adoption. But that’s a lesson for another day.”

“So if mating is for multiplying, then what’s making love for?” Eren asked.

“It’s for showing someone how much you love them when words aren’t enough anymore,” said Ladybug wisely. “And love, unlike mating, doesn’t have to be between males and females.”

“Quit misssleading him!” said Lizard. “The boy just wantss sssex, not love.”

“Love,” Eren repeated the word and frowned. “Yeah, I don’t think I love anyone.”

“What do you feel when you look at Jean?” asked Ladybug hopefully.

“Angry,” said Eren.

“No, no. Try again,” said Ladybug.

“Aggravated?” he tried. Lizard laughed.

“That’s just a bigger word for angry,” Ladybug informed him patiently.

“Well that’s how I feel!” said Eren.

“Why don’t you go look at Jean,” suggested Lizard, trying to calm him down, “and thhhen come back and tell usss how you feel?”

“Do I have to?” asked Eren.

“Yes,” said Ladybug.

“It’sss thhe only way to be sure,” said Lizard.

Eren grumbled and got up. Lizard and Ladybug hopped to the floor and watched him go.

“Hey,” said one of the blue jays. “Where’s Black Widow?”

Black Widow had been very, very busy that morning, recruiting the help of the beetles and the squirrels. After smelling love in the air as thick as a stink bomb, Black Widow decided to take matters into her own hands and lead a love revolution.

Around noon, Jean had woken to the sound of clicks and harsh chirping. Squirrels were everywhere. Jean felt some tugging at his hair and yelled, swatting at the tiny claws that scratched and twisted at his bed head. Jean shook them off and ran, finding more by the stairs leading up to Eren’s room.

“What do you want?” he asked.

Their eyes glinted and they jumped like tiny springs, launching themselves at Jean with claws full of flowers and berries. Jean ran for his life and regretted taking the armor off so soon in the game. Obviously the animals weren’t done torturing him.

When Eren came downstairs, he found Jean hiding in the water closet. Or at least, what was left of it.

It appeared there had been quite a struggle. The ancient curtains over the window had finally fallen off and were torn into pieces, layering the ground like snow. Beneath that, tiles had been pried off the floor and evidently thrown around the room, some still sticking out of the walls and below the short wooden beam across the cieling. Above the beam hung a branch decorated with little golden balls. The washing basin lay cracked and chipped against one wall as if it had also been hurled at something but missed. Little scratch marks in groups of three covered the space, all the way from the ceiling to floor, and ripped rose pedals, bent stems, crushed leaves, and even some crabapple blossoms that managed to stay intact among the chaos were thrown about the room like confetti.

The sunlight that should have been coming through the curtain-less window was blocked by a sweaty, panting body. There Jean sat on the windowsill, hugging his knees to his chest and looking at Eren wildly. His sleeves were gone, and his arms and face were covered in the same scratches that covered every other surface of the room. His longer hair at the top of his head had been woven into a dozen little twisty braids, decorated with flowers, leaves, and berries. Beneath the windowsill stood an army of squirrels, equally as beat-up looking as Jean and all holding a variety of flowers. They saw Eren and bolted, squeezing past Jean to get outside and away from the scene of the crime, leaving Jean and Eren alone in a floral bloody mess.

“What happened?” Eren asked, looking around with bewilderment. Jean didn’t move from the windowsill, staring unblinkingly at Eren. “Jean, what happened?” Eren repeated, wondering if the squirrels had somehow knocked him dizzy.

“Uh,” Jean struggled for words as a trail of blood ran down his arm from where a thorny rose had been tied mercilessly around his bicep. “The squirrels attacked me?”

He said it as if he wasn’t sure. Eren looked up at the braids in his hair. “Are you sure?” he asked.

“Yeah, but-” Jean jerked his head around to look out the window.

“Jean,” Eren said, trying to get his attention again.

“Shhh!”

“ _Jean_.”

“I said SHHH!” Jean whispered loudly. Eren heard rustling outside the window.

“What’s going on?” Eren asked.

“They are trying to set us up,” said Jean.

“ _What?_ ”

“I fought them off at first, but they’re too clever. Someone must be pulling the strings, telling them what to do…”

Eren could feel an angry knot growing in his stomach. “Jean, are you going to tell me what’s actually going on?” he asked, and he stepped forward impatiently.

Jean looked back at him, and then down at Eren’s feet as they moved closer.

“Stop!” he shouted, scrambling down from the windowsill with his hands out toward Eren.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Eren replied, walking forward just to spite him.

“Don’t move!”

“Why?”

“I think they booby trapped-!“

Jean tripped on something, and his hands crashed into Eren’s chest, pushing him back. A flurry of pedals was released from somewhere above. Eren’s elbow knocked into a vine strung tightly across a corner, and the sound of bells shook from the branch above the beam. Eren grabbed at Jean as his feet got tangled up in a web of vines that he could have sworn weren’t there yesterday. He landed on his back in a fresh bed of moss, and Jean landed on top of him, the shackles and chains jangling melodiously with the bells up above.

Jean pushed away, trying to sit up, but then a stone whistled through the window. Jean dropped back down on top of Eren to dodge it, swearing.

“Ah, get off!” Eren swatted a pedal away from his face, accidentally hitting Jean in the eye.

“Ouch! Watch it!” Jean growled, his eyes watering from the intrusion.

Eren’s breath caught when he finally got a good look at Jean, who was framed in colorful flora and golden sunlight. Jean met Eren’s gaze.

“Oh, no no no no NO,” said Jean, pushing away from Eren again. “This is just what they want!”

“What?” Eren asked. He blocked the hands beating down on his chest. “Ow! Who?”

Jean’s shackled wrists were knocked apart, and his hands sank down into the moss on either side of Eren’s head. They suctioned into the thick mud underneath, and the chain connecting his wrists pushed Eren down farther into the green bedding.

“The squirrels!” Jean finally answered him. Then he stopped moving completely.

Eren felt like the space between them was too hot and too small. He wiggled, stopping again when their legs brushed. Jean’s lips parted and he softly sucked in a breath, drawing Eren’s attention back up.

“Jean,” Eren said, planning on telling him to move. But the look Jean’s face made him stop. The squirrels watched excitedly from the windowsill, their eyes burning with triumph and eager to see if their hard work paid off. Jean opened his mouth wider, the flower pedals in his hair and settling down around them adding to the mood.

“Ah,” Jean said.

“Ah?” Eren asked, unsure.

“Ah…”

“Ah…?”

Then Jean’s whole body convulsed, and he sneezed a big “ACHOO!” right into Eren’s face. The sound startled squirrels and they scattered, and Black Widow, who had been watching from the bell-strung branch, zoomed away in defeat.

“Aaggghhh!” Eren shouted. “Yuck! Ew, man! What the heck is wrong with you?” He pushed Jean hard enough to unstick him from the mud with a watery _schwomp_ , and Jean rolled away, sneezing violently.

“Sorry, I just…” Jean sneezed again, unable to stop.

Eren left the water closet in a whirlwind of rage, stomping all the way to the other side of the temple, up the stairs, and back into the room with the tallies.

“Well? How do you feel?” asked Ladybug when he began to pace again angrily.

“Dirty!” Eren said, wiping his hands on his face. “And angry! Really angry! He’s annoying!”

The critters all let out the air they’d been holding, and Lizard stepped over Ladybug, smug as ever. “Then that,” she said nodding at the hardening bulge between Eren’s legs, “is lust, not love.”

Eren looked down and groaned angrily. “Nooo!”

“You have two choisses: take care of it yourssself, or take care of it withh Jean,” said Lizard.

Eren looked around him, dismayed. “Why are _those_ my two choices? And what can I do with Jean? We can’t mate because neither of us are girls, and now I know we can’t make love because there is no way in hell I love him!”

“You can still have sex!” one of the blue jays exclaimed. “It’s just called _casual sex_.”

Eren hid his face in his hands. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore. Can we stop for today?

“But what are you going to do about that?” asked Ladybug.

“Stop looking at it!” Eren said, hiding his erection. “You guys are as annoying as him! Leave me alone. I’ll sleep it off.”

“It’sss thhhe middle of thhhe afternoon,” said Lizard.

“I don’t care,” said Eren. “Goodnight.”

“Good afternoon,” corrected Lizard.

“Goodnight!” shouted Eren.

When Eren walked into the main room, Jean was walking in the other side, wearing nothing but his trousers. His hair was sopping and flower-free, and rivulet’s of water ran down his neck and torso. He was just slicing some long bits of wet hair from the sides of his head with a broken water closet tile when he saw Eren and stopped.

Eren turned around hastily and bumped into a pillar.

“Pffft!”

Eren straightened his headpiece and turned back to glower at Jean, who was snickering.

“What?” asked Jean. “It’s not my fault you’re a dumbass.”

Eren could feel his blood pounding in his ears. “Why are you naked!”

“I’m not,” Jean said. “Why are you blushing?”

“I’m not!”

The two looked at one another, Eren furious and Jean amused.

“I was taking a bath,” Jean said finally.

“Wow. That makes _two_ since you got here. You’re on a roll.”

“You wanted to know why I was naked!”

“Well I don’t care anymore,” Eren decided, striding over to his pedestal. He straightened his headpiece before climbing up.

Jean saw this and felt his stomach drop. “Don’t,” he said to Eren.

Eren paused halfway up. “Don’t what?”

“Mope. Or punish yourself. Whatever this is.”

“I’m not.”

“Yes you are. Get down from there. I’m sorry for laughing.”

Eren stared at him. “Dude, I’m not that fragile. I’m just going to take a nap.”

“What?”

“A nap. You know, sleeping? Because I’m tired?”

Jean opened his mouth and then closed it, feeling awkward.

“Oh,” he said, “Um… sorry. I guess.”

“Whatever.” Eren faced the other way self-consciously.

“You’ve never taken a nap before.”

Eren didn’t answer Jean. He tried to breathe normally, but every breath came out uneven or too loud. He heard Jean move to his corner and then closed his eyes.

“It’s three, by the way.”

Eren jumped. “What?”

“Three baths,” said Jean. “If you count you washing my hand.”

Eren propped himself up on his elbows, looking back at Jean. “That’s like, one percent of your skin.”

“It’s more than one percent.”

“Either way, it definitely doesn’t count as a bath.”

“Yes it does.”

“Okay, Mr. Clean,” said Eren, lying back down.

“Why do you sleep on that?”

Eren felt a jolt go through his body at the change in conversation. Jean’s voice had been casual enough, but in the silence that followed it, Eren could feel Jean’s gaze drilling into his back.

“It’s comfortable,” said Eren, bringing his knees closer to his chest. The cold stone of the pedestal pressed up against his shoulder.

“Bullshit,” said Jean. “You can’t even stretch out on it. It’s like, two square feet of flat rock.”

“I like sleeping on hard surfaces. Yours isn’t much better.”

“I know,” said Jean. “Mine is uncomfortable as hell. But it’s not as bad as yours.”

“…”

“Don’t ignore me,” said Jean.

“Don’t tell me what to do.”

“Are you a masochist?”

“Are you going to shut up and let me sleep?” snapped Eren, sitting up and turning to find Jean much closer than he thought he was. Jean’s fingers grabbed the edge of the pedestal, and he pulled himself up onto it.

“Move over,” he grunted.

“Hey!” Eren kicked a foot out at Jean, but Jean grabbed it, using it to hoist himself up.

“What if it’s a magic rock that turns into a feather mattress when you lay on it?” Jean asked, sitting next to Eren. “What if you’ve been tricking me?”

“I haven’t! And why haven’t you put a shirt on yet?”

Jean shoved Eren off the pedestal. Eren landed on his feet but stumbled, his bracelets tinkling and his headpiece clattering to the floor. He whirled around and saw Jean lying on his back awkwardly, his feet dangling off one side and his head hanging backwards off the other.

“Woah,” Jean said. “This totally sucks.”

“Get down!”

“But the floor sucks more, I think.”

Eren hesitated. “You’re lying.”

“No, I’m serious,” said Jean. “On the floor, you don’t get this nice breeze. And the moss is really itchy down there.”

“Just move so I can sleep,” Eren said.

“Nah,” said Jean. “I think I’ll stay here for a bit.”

Eren looked over at Jean’s corner. The piles of treasure glistened tauntingly. “Then _I’ll_ sleep in _your_ bed,” he said.

Jean tried not to smirk. “Are you sure? It’s horrible sleeping there. Worse than this.”

“I’ll do it.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I’m not a wimp like you,” said Eren, determined. “I’ll be fine.”

“Whatever you say.” _What the hell are you doing, Jean? Don’t give him your bed!_

“I’ll be fine,” Eren said once more, slowly approaching the corner. Jean watched him avoid the treasure and touch the mossy floor with his foot, before sinking down onto it.

He jumped back up, shrieking at Jean.

“You lied!”

“What’s the big deal?” Jean asked. “Just sleep on it.”

“No!”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t-!” Eren cut off, breathing hard. He saw his headpiece still lying on the floor by the pedestal, felt the top of his head, and then got madder still.

Jean saw this and jumped down, grabbing the headpiece before Eren could get to it. _Why are you grabbing the headpiece, idiot! Just leave it be!_

“Give it back!”

“Not until you answer me,” said Jean. “You don’t… what?”

Eren grit his teeth. “Just give it to me.”

“Why is it so important?”

“Why do you want to know everything about me?”

“Because I’m interested!”

“Interested in _what_?”

“ _You!_ ”

There was a beat where Eren’s eyes locked with Jean’s. And then Eren’s face got redder than it ever had before, and Jean nearly dropped the headpiece.

“M-Me?” Eren stuttered.

“No, ah-“ Jean fumbled around for words, but his common sense had apparently given up on him and the only words left in his brain were _woah woah woah cute cute cute!_

Eren stepped back and bumped into another pile of platters. They tumbled and crashed to the floor while Eren tried desperately to catch them from the wrong side. He ended up falling over the heap and then lifting one up to hide his face from Jean.

“Stop look at me!” Eren shouted from behind the platter.

“Uh,” Jean blinked. “Why?”

“I don’t know! You’re doing something weird!”

“I’m not doing anything,” Jean smirked, suddenly enjoying the situation immensely.

“Stop it.”

“Eren,” Jean said, laughing when Eren flinched. The polished fingernails flashed as he tightened his grip on the platter.

“What?”

“Look at me.”

“No.”

“If you look at me, I’ll give you your crown.”

“Headpiece,” said Eren.

“Whatever.”

Eren slowly lowered the platter until just his eyes peeked over. Jean smiled.

“Ugh,” Eren said, lifting the platter back up. “Okay, now give it to me.”

Jean walked forward and touched Eren’s fingers. They were burning up. Jean felt hot as well, but he suddenly wished he had put his shirt back on despite the heat.

“Are you okay?” Jean asked, ignoring his own discomfort and wondering if gods could get sick. When he didn’t get an answer, Jean pushed aside the platter.

Eren shuddered, dropping it. “Fuck you,” he said to Jean, and leaned forward to grab his headpiece. Jean pulled it away without thinking, and Eren fell into Jean.

Jean gasped when he realized Eren was hard.

“Oh shit,” he said, throwing his hands up. Eren pushed away, not looking at him.

“It’s nothing,” said Eren.

“That’s not nothing.”

“Shut up. I still hate you.”

“I- woah, what do I have to do with…”

Eren, still blushing, looked at Jean accusingly and then looked away. He held his hand out, and Jean realized he was supposed to give him the headpiece.

Instead, he grabbed Eren’s wrist and tugged, pulling Eren over to his corner and sat down on the mossy bed. Eren was pulled on top of him, and their torsos slammed together, making both of them grunt.

“What-?”

“Just trying something,” Jean assured him. Eren tensed as Jean’s fingers traveled up his arms, slipping under the tunic at his shoulder. Jean was sure Eren was about to pull away and punch him, but instead, Eren’s eyes lit up and he pushed Jean down until his back met the moss.

“Oof! Eren!”

Eren’s row of pearls flashed into a smile. The key around his neck fell onto Jean’s chest chillingly, and then Eren aligned their pelvises and _shifted_.

A noise escaped Jean’s throat that he quickly silenced by biting his own tongue. Eren laughed.

“You’re making a stupid face,” he told Jean.

“At least my face isn’t stupid all the time,” Jean retorted, trying to push Eren away and switch their positions. Instead, his hands brushed against something hard beneath his tunic, and Eren opened his mouth wide and gasped.

Jean paused. “Oh?” he said, and rubbed once more.

Eren sucked in a harsh breath and released it with a whine. Jean found the other nipple with his left hand and pinched it, still rubbing the right one, and Eren’s eyes slipped closed above Jean.

“You… fuck…” Eren panted nonsensically, moving with the touch. Jean watched, mesmerized, and then shimmied down and tongued the left one through the tunic.

“Nng,” it was Jean’s turn to groan, right into Eren’s chest when Eren’s knee found his groin. He stopped licking and started sucking, and Eren arched into it, breathing heavy.

“Jean,” Eren hissed.

“Hm?”

“Jean,” Eren began whispering. “Jean, Jean.”

Jean released the clothes nipple and looked up. “What?” But then Jean realized one of Eren’s arms was between their bodies, and he followed the limb down and saw him plaming himself through his tunic.

Jean stared.

“Jean,” Eren moaned, louder. Jean had stopped touching Eren, but the other boy continued touching himself, panting and moaning Jean’s name.

Eren shuddered, hunched over Jean with the key dangling between them, and then he collapsed, tipping to the side and falling into the moss.

Jean stared up at the sunlight filtering through the ceiling. He was still painfully hard, but his body was in so much shock he found he couldn’t move.

“Jean,” Eren said next to him. Jean looked over at the clearly satisfied, too-beautiful-to-be-legal person lying next to him.

“…Yeah?” Jean asked, his voice cracking.

“I still hate you,” Eren said sleepily. Jean looked at the blush on Eren’s face as he drifted off to sleep, and then he looked back up at the ceiling. A beetle hung there, staring down at him.

“He’s too obvious,” Jean said to it. “He loves me, right?”

The beetle dropped, and Jean would have screamed if he hadn’t been so used to bugs landing on him by now.

But then he did scream when a tiny trumpet made from a hollowed twig was blasting in his ear. Jean hollered, flicking the beetle away, and then he looked down at his feet, where a theatre company of beetles was awaiting his attention.

“What the fuck is this,” Jean said to the unconscious person beside him. Eren slept on, obviously.

A tiny curtain made of leaves was flown off by two of the glistening insects. In its place stood two beetles, one with a mossy wig that stood spiky at the top, and the other with a tiny shiny bead hanging around its neck.

The beetle with the miniature trumpet returned to center stage pointed up at him.

“What?” Jean asked it.

The beetled pointed at the beetle with the moss-wig, and then back at Jean again. Jean realized the moss-beetle was supposed to be him, and even saw blades of grass connecting its two sets of its limbs like his shackles and chains. The one standing next to it must have been Eren, with a key around his neck.

Jean suddenly felt queasy. “I don’t want to watch this,” he told the beetles. But it was too late. He was watching it. It was happening. And he didn’t have the heart to squash them.

The beetles began a performance that lasted way too long. It was probably only about twenty minutes, but it slowly replayed his and Eren’s first meeting, and then their fights, and then the horrible, awful, terrible, embarrassing almost-kiss-but-definitely-a-hug that recently happened by the fountain, and then it got a little steamy and-

“STOP!” Jean started flicking them away. “Cut it out, you tiny perverts!”

The trumpet played again, and more beetles came into the scene on both sides, some wearing bits of feathers and flapping their arms, and some trying to slither like snakes, but they pushed Beetle-Eren and Beetle-Jean together, until the two beetles kissed.

Jean tried to slam his hand down on them to kill them, but Beetle-Jean was already buzzing away with Beetle-Eren, loopy in pretend-love and drawing invisible hearts in the air above Actual-Jean’s head.

“I said stop!” Jean shouted after them, swinging his arms to try and break the horrible omen apart. “I hate you all! Buzz off!”

The beetles scuttled and buzzed away, feeling very proud of themselves.

“What’s going on?” Eren said sleepily.

Jean got up and tried not to explode into rainbows and sunshine after seeing Eren’s messy hair. “Nothing,” he said. “Just gotta take a whiz.”

Eren mumbled, still half-asleep, and then flopped back down.

Jean left the room and spent the rest of the day chasing anything that looked even remotely like a beetle, stomping them out.

Eren slept until the next morning on the comfy pile of moss, while Jean jacked off in the water closet, feeling a little bit bitter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow I really kept that birds and bees joke rolling SORRY.


	4. It's Probably Not Diarrhea

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 4 of JTES is also posted on [my tumblr](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/post/86062948961/jeans-treasure-erens-slave-part-4)!

Eren woke up feeling very different. He stretched, but instead of his back carrying out its usual twinges and pops, his muscles tightened contently. He paused, realizing his joints weren’t screaming their morning pain either. Eren felt around for the edges of his pedestal. His fingers met a soft, edgeless sponge that rose around his body and fingers comfortably.

He braced himself for the worst and opened his eyes, knowing what he was about to find.

“Shit,” he said. Sure enough, he wasn’t on the pedestal. He sat up gloomily, looking around at the wall of treasure encircling the mossy bed. By the angle the sun was slanting in through the crumbling ceiling, he could tell it was almost noon.

“What do you have to look so glum about?” Jean’s grumpy voice greeted him.

Eren whipped around, ready to be furious. Jean was sitting with his arms folded on top of an overturned jug, his eyelids drooping heavily. His stupid hairstyle was so messy that it looked even stupider, and because of the bags under Jean’s eyes, Eren wondered if he had been up all night.

“Were you watching me sleep? Gross!” Eren yelped, trying to cover his clothed body with his arms.

Jean’s tired gaze followed Eren’s chinking bracelets lazily. “Don’t be such a cocky drama queen,” he said. Truthfully, he had been, but he wasn’t about to admit that to either of them.

“I’m not a drama queen,” Eren said, getting off the bed of moss. He looked at it in disgust, and then at Jean with the same expression.

“What?” Jean asked.

“This is your fault.”

“…Huh?” Jean replied. He was a little slow on the uptake, considering he had spent the entire night rubbing his cock and picturing Eren’s face as he came over and over and _over._ And now here was the guy responsible for it standing in front of him, looking well-rested as fuck and accusing him of who-knows-what, after jacking off to Jean without his permission and leaving him to take care of himself! “What’s my fault?” he asked grumpily.

Eren was growing more and more flustered by how _cute_ sleepy Jean was. But no, Eren had more important things to think about right now.

“You let me sleep here!” he said with a stomp. The front of his tunic crinkled stiffly against his lower abdomen, and they both looked down.

“Is that…?” Jean trailed off.

“Oh my god!” Eren shouted. The memories of the night before pelted him like bird poop. “We actually-”

“ _We_?” asked Jean, feeling more embarrassed by the second. “ _I_ had nothing to do with it. As I remember it, _you_ were on top of _me_.”

Eren scowled. Jean glared back, hating how anyone could look so adorable with that expression. And then he hated himself for thinking that.

“You pulled me on your lap first,” Eren said.

“But then you pushed me down,” Jean snapped back.

“Only because you started groping me!”

“Well the least you could’ve done was grope me in return! All you did was grope yourself!”

“Shut up!” Eren grasped a handful of coins and threw them at Jean.

“You were moaning, ‘Oh Jean, you’re so hot-’”

“I never said you were hot!” Eren chucked a painted bowl, but Jean ducked behind the wall of treasure on the other side of the moss. The bowl shattered behind him on a pillar.

“Woah, calm down,” Jean said, peeking over his barricade.

“How can I calm down?” Eren seethed. He grabbed a heavy silver candlestick and lobbed it over the treasure. “You stink!”

“I smell delightful!” Jean yelled, noisily knocking the candlestick away with a platter. He flung a chalice and it fell embrassingly short of his mark, clanging against the headpiece lying in the moss.

Eren, spotting the headpiece and realizing it wasn’t on his head, lunged for it. Jean was faster, throwing himself over the wall of treasure and snatching up the accessory.

“Give it back,” Eren said, grabbing for it.

“Ha!” Jean jumped back, placing it on his head.

“You have no right to wear it!” Eren said. He saw something sticking out from a pile and grabbed it. Coins and bowls and jewels toppled over as he pulled, until what appeared to be an ancient boat paddle broke free. Eren swung it menacingly back, ready to smack Jean with it.

“Wait-!” Jean hollered, holding onto the headpiece as he ducked for dear life. The paddle crashed into another pile of treasure next to him, sending shards of clay pots and glass-blown jewelry all over Jean’s moss bed.

“Give it back!” Eren demanded, swinging again.

“Stop it! You’re ruining all my treasure!” said Jean deserately.

“ _My_ treasure!” said Eren.

“You sure don’t act like it belongs to you!”

“My offerings are mine to do with what I please!”

Jean rolled to safety and grabbed the first vase he could see. “Sorry babe,” he whispered to it, and then he chucked it at Eren.

 _Crash!_ The paddle met the clay vase in mid-air, and it crumbled into a heavy dust. Jean watched it turn into a pile of nothing, wondering how old it must have been to disintegrate on impact.

“Shit,” said Jean.

Eren looked at the rubble, horrified. “That was my first offering,” he whispered.

“Oh,” said Jean, not sure what else to say. Eren locked accusing eyes on him.

“This is all your fault,” he said.

“What?” Jean’s voice cracked in astonishment. “You’re the one swinging a freaking paddle around like a maniac!”

“You started it. Just give me the headpiece and stop ruining my life.”

“How am I ruining your life? It’s just a dumb piece of jewelry.” Jean reached up to secure the headpiece.

Eren hesitated, afraid that going for the headpiece himself would end in a repeat of last night’s events. He took a deep breath and explained, “It’s my burden, not yours.”

“Burden? What burden?”

“The treasure,” said Eren.

“How the heck is treasure a burden?”

“It just is. You wouldn’t get it.”

Jean was finally connecting the pieces. The reason Eren wouldn’t let anyone take the treasure was the same reason he didn’t want to look at it or even clean it. “This is the same kind of shit as your stupid pedestal rule, isn’t it?” Jean asked.

“What pedestal rule?”

“You know the one I’m talking about. Where you don’t deserve nice things.”

“Nevermind,” Eren said, deciding he would steal it back later. He looked around and noticed the two of them were the only living entities in the room. “Where is everybody?”

“Don’t change the subject,” said Jean.

“What subject?”

“The subject about you contradicting yourself all the time,” said Jean.

“How do I contradict myself, exactly?” Eren asked.

 “By keeping treasure because you think you don’t deserve it. Which makes no sense, by the way,” said Jean.

“I said nevermind.”

“No, we are going to talk about this because it’s pissing me off.”

“Well _you are_ pissing me off,” said Eren.

“You’re letting all this valuable shit go to waste! At least enjoy it!” Jean said. Knowing how rich he could become with just an armload of the stuff made him want to cry.

“What about ‘nevermind’ don’t you understand? Just drop it, okay?”

“Why do you torture yourself like this? Did you kill someone? Or are you so bored that it helps pass the time?”

“I already told you why,” Eren stated.

“Being born the way you are is not a real reason,” Jean said.

Eren rubbed at his bracelets, visibly upset. “Yes it is!”

Jean ripped the headpiece off his head and held it out between them. “So what is this, then? Is it made with some sort of personalized spell that burns into your scalp when you where it?”

“Don’t be absorbed,” said Eren.

“What? Are you messing up your words again?” Jean asked.

“No, I meant… don’t be… assured,” Eren said, struggling.

“Adored?” Jean guessed.

“Upward,” said Eren, deciding that was the right word. “Don’t be so upward, Jean.”

“I still don’t think that’s right.”

“I don’t care, okay?” Eren shouted. “Just don’t be so stupid!”

“You’re the one being stupid,” said Jean. “Look, this thing isn’t even good quality.” He held the headpiece in both his hands and started to bend it.

In the next millisecond a forced hit Jean’s chest and knocked him backward. He stumbled, gasping for breath as the headpiece was clawed from his grip. Then Eren’s hot breath was washing over his face, growling, “Don’t do that, you fucking thief.”

Jean would have been scared, but he knew Eren wouldn’t kill him without his powers. He leaned back a few inches and blew air back in Eren’s face, and Eren sputtered and reeled away.

“Relax, it’s just a headpiece,” Jean sighed, remembering how tired he was.

“It’s a symbol!” Eren blurted out.

Jean raised his eyebrows. “A symbol? Of what, exactly?”

Eren looked down at the moss and mumbled crossly.

Jean put a hand up to his ear. “What was that? It’s a symbol of your virginity?”

“No!” Eren shoved him, more flustered than ever. “Eternity!”

“…Pardon?”

“Eternity, like forever. The circle reminds me that I’ll be here forever, get it?”

“What?!” asked Jean, bursting out in laughter. “That’s so _stupid_!”

“I don’t think it is,” Eren said, touching his headpiece.

“That’s because you never had anyone around to tell you the truth!” Jean guffawed. “These self-imposed punishments are seriously so lame. _Circle of eternity_. It sounds like a perfume brand!”

“What’s ape fume brandy?”

“Perfume,” Jean said, placing his hands on Eren’s shoulders and trying to be serious. “It’s stuff that you wear to smell good.”

Eren fiddled with the headpiece moodily. “But that’s not what this is,” he insisted.

“I know, I know. It’s so you can wear it and think, _Oh poor me, my life sucks_. Right?”

“It sounds stupid when you say it out loud.”

“That’s because it _is_ stupid,” Jean told him. “Don’t you see? Same goes for keeping all this treasure around just to remind yourself that you don’t deserve it.”

“Does the headpiece look stupid?” Eren asked suddenly. He placed it on his head, obviously feeling self-conscious.

Jean looked sleepily at Eren. “Not really,” he admitted, smiling. “Not to sound cheesy, but I honestly don’t think anything could look bad on you.”

“What?” Eren asked.

“Hm?” Jean yawned.

“You just said something weird,” Eren said. Jean’s chained hands were still resting on his shoulders.

“Oh. Cheesy,” Jean said, distracted by the rosy color dusting Eren’s cheeks. “Like cheese, you know, a milk product. It’s another way to say something sounds lame.”

“No not that,” Eren said. “I was talking about the part where you said I’m attractive.”

Jean cocked his head. “I said that?”

“Not exactly.” Eren’s shoulders were fidgeting beneath Jean’s hands.

Jean noticed. “What’s wrong?”

“I feel sort of sick,” said Eren. He lowered his gaze until green orbs locked onto Jean’s mouth.

Jean licked his lips, and Eren mimicked the action.

“Do you feel feverish?” Jean asked, enjoying the way Eren’s eyes didn’t waver from his mouth.

“No, I feel kind of sick to my stomach. Maybe I’m about to get diarrhea. Hey Jean?”

“Huh,” Jean answered.

“Why are you moving closer?”

“I’m not.”

“Yes you are.”

“Okay, I lied.”

“Oh god,” said Eren. “I’m gonna shit myself.”

“Don’t worry, I don’t think you have diarrhea,” said Jean. “Just butterflies.”

“Since when are you a medicine ma- _nph!_ ”

Jean pulled away. Eren pressed a hand to his tingling mouth, aghast. Jean chuckled dopily.

“What the hell was that?” Eren shouted around his hand.

“A kiss.”

“Why would you do a kiss?”

“You were staring at my mouth like you wanted to devour it,” said Jean, smirking. “And you don’t _do_ a kiss.”

“I wasn’t looking a it like that,” said Eren, untangling from Jean’s chains and backing away. He wiped his mouth and paused. “Was I?”

“You were,” said Jean.

“Well! You’re the one who always looks at me like I’m something to steal! You thief!”

“Really?” Jean laughed. “It must be because you’re so pretty.”

“I… you…t-that…!” Eren stammered, tripping on items lying around from their fight as he continued to back up. “That doesn’t mean you should shove your face against mine!” He scooted around a low wall of treasure to escape Jean’s bed.

“I told you, it was a kiss. It’s calling kissing… You didn’t like it?”

“No! Why would I like something like that?”

“But you’re turning red,” Jean pointed out.

“I just told you I was feeling sick!”

“I thought that you- Well, you know? I thought it was obvious,” Jean said, chains jingling as he scratched the back of his head.

Eren, now half a room away, planted his feet apart firmly and tried his best to look angry despite the blush taking over his features. “What was so obvious? Because I definitely wasn’t thinking, _Gee, I really want to taste this jackass’s spit right now_!”

“No. I meant, well, you know.”

“I know what?” Eren asked.

“That you,” Jean paused and made a vague gesture with his hands, “you know?”

“Stop saying I know, because I don’t know,” said Eren.

“That you, you know, _like_ me,” Jean said, finally.

Eren balked, staring at Jean like he had slapped him in the face. “Like you? As in… _that_ kind of like?”

Jean nodded.

“As if!” said Eren. “Why? Do _you_ like me or something?”

“Well, yeah. Sort of.”

“I-“ Eren’s anger whooshed away, and he stopped moving. “What?”

“I sort of like you, okay?”

“What?” Eren repeated.

“But you liked me first,” Jean quickly added.

“No I didn’t,” said Eren, unblinking. “I don’t. I never will.”

“But what about last night? You liked that, right?”

“Last night,” Eren tried to remember the phrase he had learned, “was casual sex.”

“That wasn’t sex!”

“I’m pretty sure that was sex,” said Eren.

“Where are you even getting these terms from?”

Eren stood up straighter. “I know many things.”

“No you don’t!” Jean shouted, not quite sure why he felt so furious. “You don’t know anything!”

“I know how to kick your ass,” said Eren.

“The only thing you know about asses is how to be one,” said Jean, grinding his teeth. “You are the most selfish, unfeeling, inhuman-”

“Yes,” Eren cut hum off loudly. “I am not human.”

“Oh!” Jean said, mockingly. “Is the pity party still on? I thought we decided to cancel that.”

“No, _you_ decided. I’m not going to hide from my fate just because you tricked me into one night of pleasure and rest.”

“I didn’t trick you into anything,” said Jean, trying to slow down his angry breathing. “You can’t blame me for how you felt. And you had no trouble pleasuring yourself, which is something you can do with or without me.”

“I won’t do it at all. It’s not going to happen again,” said Eren.

“Fine!” shouted Jean.

“Fine!” shouted Eren.

 _Pop!_ Jean blinked, looking around for Eren. He had disappeared, taking the stupid headpiece with him. Jean could hear the mountain god splashing around and mumbling to himself in the fountain room, and Jean wondered how on earth he had moved so fast.

“Creepy as shit, if you ask me,” mumbled Jean to himself, crouching down to pick up sharp shards of glass and clay littering his mossy bed. He rubbed his eyes, wanting to take a nap but not wanting to wake up full of little cuts. So he continued cleaning.

The animals, who had watched the argument escalate, and then change direction, and then end catastrophically, crept out from their hiding places to discuss.

“Jean is in love,” Black Widow sighed dreamily.

“He never actually said the word love,” Dove pointed out. “And it’s not like Eren likes him back anyway.”

“Well _I_ think they’re going to end up together,” said Ladybug. “You know, happily ever after and all that jazz.”

Lizard stepped in and hissed, “Eren will do no sssuch thhhhing.”

“Jean stomps! Jean kills!” chanted the beetles.

“It’ss a forsssed relationship,” said Lizard. “Jean isss ruining Eren’sss life. Jean should leave, dead or alive.”

“Well I’m on Jean’s side,” said Black Widow firmly. “The poor kid had his heart trampled on today.”

“Wait, we’re taking sides?” asked a blue jay.

“Shouldn’t we side with Eren? He’s been here longer,” said Dove.

“But Jean’s got a better sense of style,” said a squirrel.

“Definitely! Have you noticed his hair?” asked Black Widow.

“ _Noticed_ it? We got to _feel_ it!” the squirrel said, and the ones behind him nodded.

“You mean that horse mane? Gross,” said a dragonfly. “We’re siding with Eren.”

“You guys! We can’t decide who we’re siding with based on their hair style!” said Ladybug.

“We shouldn’t be siding at all!” said the blue jay.

“I call being on team Jean,” said another blue jay, raising his wing.

“Trevor!” the first blue jay scolded him.

“Team Jean?” Pig #1 asked Pig #2.

“Team Jean,” agreed Pig #2.

“Thhhose of you who have an ounsse of loyal left, come withhh me,” said Lizard. She moved off to the fountain room with the beetles, bees, birds, dragonflies, blue jays (minus Trevor), and reptiles behind her. Black Widow, Ladybug, Trevor, the two pigs, and the squirrels all stayed behind, feeling a bit guilty.

“Now what?” asked a squirrel.

Black Widow nodded at Jean, who was trying to put a jeweled plate back together rather pathetically.

“Now,” she said, “we have some cheering up to do.”

Eren, irritated and naked, was scrubbing his clothes and cursing Jean under his breath when his forest friends got to him.

“He tricked me,” snarled Eren.

“But it felt good, right?” asked a dragonfly.

“That’s the whole problem!” Eren shouted, slamming his clothes down in the water. The splash had the insects running for cover.

The birds shook droplets from their feathers, startled by Eren’s reaction. “What is the problem, exactly?” a sparrow asked.

“The problem is that jerk! He made me forget about everything,” said Eren. “The stuff he says, the things he does, even the way he looks at me is all wrong. I’m not supposed to be feeling good, remember? I’m not supposed to be sleeping well, or receiving compliments, or doing kisses, or any of that human stuff.”

“Why not?” buzzed a bee.

“Because human stuff is human!” said Eren, going back to scrub his clothes.

“We’ve never really asked you this,” a blue jay timidly twittered, “but how do you decide your rules of living?”

“Yeah, like, what makes sleeping on a pedestal good and sleeping on the floor bad?” another blue jay asked.

“It’s simple: I don’t deserve a comfy place to sleep,” said Eren.

“Why?” they asked.

“Because I’m a monster,” said Eren. “Jean even admitted it. He said I was inhuman.”

“Sssso basssically,” Lizard climbed up to his shoulder. “Anythhhing human isss off limitsss.”

“Exactly,” said Eren, happy that Lizard always seemed to understand him. He held his sopping tunic out, checking for any stains he might have missed.

“But even we sleep in comfy places,” the blue jays reminded him. “That’s not a human trait.”

“You’re not monsters,” Eren told them, smiling bitterly.

Dove, who had been hard at work thinking, decided to make a proposal.

“I think these rules might be a little outdated,” he said.

“Excuse me?” Eren asked, pausing in the middle of laying his clothes out to dry.

“I think we need to move to the next level,” said Dove.

Eren sat up straight, his attention fixed on the white bird before him. “There’s a next level?”

“Oh yes,” said Dove, ignoring the suspicious look Lizard was giving him. “Your rules were fine, but like I said, they’re a little outdated. You’ve been sticking to physical limitations, like no sleeping through the night and so on. But let’s throw those out and deprive you of the most human trait of all.”

“Pooping?”

“Pooping isn’t restricted to humans, Eren,” Dove said. “Everybody poops.”

“It’s true, I read it in a book once,” piped up a beetle.

“What was the book called?” asked a bee.

“Everybody Poops,” said the beetle.

“Oh.”

“Anyway,” the Dove said loudly, reclaiming the spotlight, “I’m not talking about bowel movements. I’m talking about love.”

A murmur ran through the group, some of them confused, and others skeptical.

“Quiet,” ordered Lizard. “Let’ss sssee what Dove hasss to sssay.”

“Thank you, Lizard. I’m saying this: From what I’ve observed, you dislike the human called Jean, correct?”

“I despise Jean,” said Eren.

“Fabulous,” cooed Dove. “Then all you have to do is keep yourself from loving him.”

“It doesn’t sound very hard. How is that a punishment?” Eren asked.

“It isn’t hard if you don’t make it hard,” said Dove smartly.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” asked a blue jay, growing impatient with the rest of the lot.

“I’ve heard of thhis,” said Lizard. “Humansss get attached thhhrough emotional and physsical contact. Thhhe more intimate, thhhe harder it iss to keep from falling in love.”

Eren’s eyes lit up. “So all I have to do is get as close to Jean without falling in love with him?”

“Precisely,” said Dove.

“And getting close to him is punishment too!” exclaimed Eren, beaming. “Dove, you’re a genius!”

“I don’t know about thhhis,” said Lizard.

But everyone was too busy shaking Dove’s wing and congratulating him on his brilliance to hear Lizard’s words of wariness. Eren was humming cheerily, smoothing out the fabric of his tunic over the uneven, faded tiles.

As soon as his clothes dried, Eren put them on and went out to make a fake apology to Jean. It was step one in his new way of life. But what he saw was not what he expected.

Instead of sulking, Jean was twirling in front of the cracked mirror, wearing pounds upon pounds of jewelry atop fancy clothes that Eren could never bring himself to wear. The pigs were at his feet, dancing around him noisily and wearing jewelry of their own.

The squirrels were busy digging in the piles, clearly looking for more things Jean could try on. A blue jay (Trevor, the traitor) was sitting on Jean’s shoulder tweeting a happy-go-lucky tune.

“What the hell is this,” Eren asked.

Jean stopped twirling, trying to strike a pose in the mirror but staggering a bit. He turned, trying to find Eren. “Woah,” he said, laughing. “There you are, cranky pants.”

Jean fell onto his back as the world spun around him. Trevor fluttered down, twittering nervously as Eren approached, brewing over them like a dark storm. The pigs and the squirrels burrowed themselves in the piles of treasure, knowing that Eren’s anger wasn’t directed solely at Jean this time.

“What is your problem?” Eren asked.

“Uck, wait a second, I’m feeling a bit seasick,” said Jean, throwing a arm full of bangles over his eyes.

Eren wondered what seasick was but bit his tongue, waiting until Jean sat up. When he did, Eren pushed him back down with his foot.

“Apologize!” Eren shouted.

“Oof- hey! What the hell, Eren?” Jean asked.

“You have no right!” Eren spat.

“Oh come on! You don’t use it, so why can’t I?”

“I’m not talking about the treasure, moron,” said Eren.

“Then what?” Jean asked, not trying to sit up anymore.

Eren glared at the pigs and the squirrels sticking their noses out from under coins and rubies, and then shot the same disapproving look at Trevor. “Whose idea was this?”

There was a moment of silence where nobody talked.

“WHOSE IDEA WAS THIS?” he bellowed, stomping his foot down on Jean’s chest.

A small squeak came from the mirror, and Eren’s head snapped toward the noise.

“You,” he said, lower than ever. “Come here. Now.”

Jean noticed a little spider and an even littler ladybug for the first time, and the pair hopped off the mirror and scuttled over on the floor bravely. Jean watched, terrified Eren might squash them. But then Jean felt a water droplet hit his neck. He looked up, surprised to see tears falling from Eren’s face.

“Get out,” Eren said to the two insects.

The spider squeaked.

“Bullshit. Obviously we were never really friends,” Eren said, his voice cracking. “Now get out, before I step on you.”

The spider and ladybug scuttled closer.

“Out!” Eren shouted, and the insects vanished with a _pop!_ Jean lifted his head and stared at the spot, remembering how Eren had disappeared earlier.

“And the rest of you,” said Eren to the pigs, squirrels, and Trevor. “You’re banished, too.”

The squirrels clicked their mouths and scrambled for the exits, some climbing vines and darting through holes in the ceiling alongside the lone blue jay. The pigs were slower about it, giving Eren a despairing look before slumping out through the passageways.

A group of critters watched from the doorway of the fountain room, stunned.

Jean had enough. He took Eren’s leg and shoved it upwards, hearing the satisfying thump of Eren’s back landing flat against the floor.

“Ouch!”

Jean threw himself on top of him, moving his arms behind and then in front Eren’s head so that the chains connecting his shackled wrists would twist around Eren’s neck. Eren gasped, clawing at Jean’s arms and then at the chains threatening to choke him.

“What the fuck was that?” Jean asked. Eren glanced over at the door leading to the fountain room. He chirped, hissed, and then buzzed, but none of the creatures standing there made a move to help him.

“They aren’t gonna help you, not after what they just saw. Now answer me, Eren,” Jean hissed, pulling the chain tighter. Eren switched his panicked gaze up to Jean, and Jean saw the tears were still falling from the corners of his eyes. “Stop crying you fucking moron, and tell me what the fuck that was just now.”

Eren coughed. “Fuck you!”

Jean lowered himself so their foreheads were touching, the heavy jewelry sliding down his arms and clinking around his neck. “Jealousy is ugly as fuck,” Jean whispered, “and right now, you are hideous.”

“What are you talking about?” Eren coughed.

“Having a bit of fun with someone who isn’t you isn’t a crime.”

“Let go of me,” said Eren.

“I’m beginning to see your sense of right and wrong is really messed up,” said Jean. “Do you even know what real evil is, Eren? Have you ever seen someone murdered? Raped? Hung for a crime they didn’t commit? Do you even know what these words mean?”

“I said let go!” Eren said, and suddenly, the chains disappeared. With a _pop!_ Just like Eren had vanished during their argument, and just like the spider and the ladybug had vanished a moment ago.

Jean found the chain between his ankles was also gone. He stared and stared at the emptiness between his shackles, and then stared down at Eren, who was feeling his neck, looking shocked.

“You’re not powerless,” Jean said, but at the same time Eren whispered, “You can do magic?”

The blinked at each other, and then Jean jumped up. “I can’t do magic, you idiot!” Jean exclaimed. “You’ve been doing it this whole time!”

“I can’t,” said Eren, his signature scowl back.

“Stop being stubborn for two seconds and just think about it,” said Jean. “You teleported. You made the bugs disappear. You made my chains disappear.”

“The bugs ran off because I told them to,” said Eren.

“No, they vanished! There was even a little popping sound!”

“So what are you saying? That I’m lying?”

“No, I’m saying you have your powers and you don’t even realize it!”

“Don’t be absurd,” Eren said. For a moment, his face lit up and he repeated, “Don’t be adsurd. The word was absurd!”

“Cool, great,” Jean said quickly, “But seriously Eren! Do something else.”

“I can’t,” said Eren, getting angry again. “The offering prevents me from doing anything for a year.”

“Try it! Try anything! Wait, no, try taking my shackles off, and then I can get out of here!”

“I can’t!”

“Just try it!”

“I can’t, Jean. I just can’t.”

“Oh my god, you stubborn asshole! Have you ever tried using your powers after that stupid deal you made?”

“Of course I’ve tried,” Eren said. “But it’s a really powerful spell. Once the offering is made, it’s set for a year.”

Jean looked at him, horrified.

“Hey, Eren.”

“ _What_?”

“Have you ever tried getting out of here?”

Eren’s shoulders rose up as he bristled tensely. “What?”

“I mean, have you ever _tried_ tried?” asked Jean.

Eren lowered his face and peered at Jean from beneath his stupid symbolic headpiece, his jewel-like eyes flashing.

“What kind of freak question is that?” he asked.

Jean’s arm hairs to stood on end. “Just try-”

“I have an idea,” Eren cut in, his voice icy. “How about _you_ try getting out?”

“I-I can’t,” said Jean. The temperature in the room seemed to have dropped dramatically.

“Try it,” said Eren again. A breeze whipped up behind him, blasting Jean with chilly air. Eren’s key lifted up in the wind as if it were made of paper. “And if you can’t get out, then get as far away from me as possible, before I rip your dirty thieving heart out.”

Jean started running before he realized how terrified he was. He ran faster than he had run the first time they met, when Eren ripped through the ceiling and shook the mountain. Jean’s instincts were telling him to keep running, but the barrier at the temple exit stopped him. The silver shackles were still engraved with spells, and Jean knew he didn’t have an ounce of magic in him to break them. He looked back, afraid Eren might have followed, but the empty passage assured him he was alone.

This was stupid. Jean shouldn’t be afraid of Eren. Eren was powerless until the next offering, right?

It started pouring rain, and Jean sat as close to the exit as he could, staring out at the forest beyond. The sky had grown dark in a matter of minutes, and Jean shivered, pulling his knees in to his chest.

To his surprised, the two pigs sneaked up to the steps and joined him to sulk.

“What a dick, am I right?” Jean asked them.

The pigs shrugged, seeming to understand where Eren was coming from.

“Jesus, you guys are forgiving,” said Jean. “Aren’t you worried about where you’ll live now? I hope those bugs find somewhere too… if they’re still alive, that is.”

Then Jean spotted something red clinging to the belly of one of the pigs, and realized it was the ladybug.

“Hey! You found one!” Jean said, surprising himself at how relieved he sounded. “What about the spider?”

The pig that wasn’t sheltering the ladybug from the rain leaned a bit so Jean could see its belly. Sure enough, there was the spider, safe and dry. Jean suddenly felt like crying.

“Can I ask you guys a favor? Not to assume anything just because you’re all swine, but do you happen to know a huge boar by the name of Bob?”

The pigs nodded. Affirmative.

“Could you possibly find him and tell him to come see me? I want to ask him about Eren.”

The pigs shrugged.

“If I try and get Eren to let you back in, will you help me?”

The pigs squealed and set off down the steps in the pouring rain. Jean assumed that meant yes, and sighed in exhaustion. Eren was a spoiled brat, but for some reason, the animals loved him.

Jean must have nodded off to the sound of rain pattering leaves and rushing down the mountain path, because when he opened his eyes, it had grown significantly darker. Something warm and furry surrounded him.

“GAH!” Jean yelped, realizing he was being engulfed by a hoard of sleeping squirrels. They all jerked awake when Jean spasmed, and they looked at him, shivering and damp.

Jean sighed. “If he finds you here, you’re all gonna get in trouble,” he told them.

The squirrels ruffled their tails and stuck their noses up. Jean snorted.

“Fine, don’t blame me if he turns you into squirrel soup.”

They stuck to his sides, trying to get warm. As Jean began dozing off again, his mind wandered to Eren, who was probably sleeping on his pedestal by now, all alone.

The loneliness hit Jean so hard that his eyes shot open. He missed his family back home. He missed the bustling of towns, and open space of meadows, and the sounds of the fisherman returning to the docks.

And then he thought of Eren all alone in the temple, for hundreds and hundreds of years. He imagined the animals dying, with new ones keeping him company every decade or so. The offerings came once a year, where he got to see glimpses of other people, figuring out who was new, who might have died, and then spending another year sitting like a statue and waiting.

And then for someone like Jean to come in and accuse him of never trying to get out, of not even attempting to use magic…

Jean decided he was a horrible person. He decided he needed to apologize.

And he also decided that he was allergic to squirrels, and that he most definitely was _not_ crying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Congrats on making it through the ONLY chapter of angst! It’s all rainbows and butterflies and dancing forest friends and cuddling and kinky ass shit after this.
> 
> Thank you so much for all the wonderful comments and messages both here and tumblr! You are all really the best :')


	5. Under the Weather

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted [here](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/post/88217639541/jeans-treasure-erens-slave-part-5-7).

The sky was so dark that Jean couldn’t tell if the sun had set, or if the storm clouds were just so thick and heavy that they blocked out all evidence of daylight altogether. His tears dried, and the ground grew wet with roaring rain. Jean felt himself relaxing with the white noise surrounding him, and he wondered what time it was, or what day it was. How long had he been here? Weeks? Months? And in all that time, it hadn’t rained once.

Now as it came down in torrents, the water bubbled back up from the dirt and gargled down the uneven steps that lead to the village a few miles below. It trickled through the ceiling and followed the grooves in the pillars that lined the passageway, down to the cracked floor tiles where the weeds and moss drank it up.

Jean was nodding off, about to join the squirrels snuggling around him in their nap, when a howling wind blew into the temple entrance, bringing a wall of rain with it.

“Noo!” yelled a squirrel, and it along with about a dozen others leapt up from their slumber to shield Jean’s totally awesome (in their opinion) hairdo.

All Jean heard, however, was an alarming shriek drowned out by a sudden clap of thunder, and all he saw were a dozen bristle-tailed rodents illuminated by lightning, reaching their sharp little claws toward his beautiful (in his opinion) face.

Jean hollered, jumping and kicking and swatting and ducking. The squirrels protecting his hair against the rain held on for dear life.

“I thought you were nice!” Jean shouted. “Cute even!”

The squirrels shrieked back, determined not to let his hair get wet.

After a few minutes of flailing around, Jean gave up trying to pull them off for fear of ripping his hair out. He shivered, and the squirrels on his head shivered along; Jean could feel them jump and flinch with every lightning strike outside.

“So one minute you’re coming at my face, and then next you’re using me as a thunder-shield?” Jean grumbled at them.

“We were protecting your hair!”

“Yeah, squeak squawk to you too,” Jean said bitterly, wishing he could understand them at least a little bit. He hadn’t worked up the nerve to apologize to Eren quite yet, so he walked back into the temple hoping to find someplace a little drier to gather his courage.

In the first hallway he entered, Jean suddenly felt extremely dizzy. He leaned against a wall heavily.

“I’m just tired,” he said when a squirrel patted his cheek with a concerned paw. “I need a few hours of sleep, that’s all. Preferably somewhere away from the rain.”

Unfortunately, the foundation of the temple seemed to tilt in a way Jean had not noticed before now. As his shackled feet jingled along the passageways toward the main room, water from outside trickled past his feet in the same direction, rising to his ankles and then his calves. He turned down the final hall and splashed into the main room, where his bed in the corner was already under a shallow pool of gathering rainwater. The main room was flooding, and it was flooding fast.

He sloshed on through, looking for signs of Eren. The temple was unusually dark, with the melody of thunder and rain rendering his listening skills useless.

“Ouch!” Jean hissed, stubbing his toe on something solid. The claws clinging to his scalp and shoulders tightened as he stumbled, each squirrel giving out a chirp of sympathy. Lightning flashed through the cracks and holes of the building, and heaps of golden treasure glinted beneath the surface of the rising water. Birds trilled and fluttered above the ceiling beams. Another flash of lightning lit the crooked room, casting bold shadows behind crumbling pillars, and Jean’s eyes locked on the figure sitting atop the pedestal.

“Why am I not surprised,” he said loudly, his voice coming out more hostile than he’d intended. Even though Jean had decided to apologize for his accusations, the sight of Eren returning to statue mode twisted his gut. And the pain in his toe wasn’t helping his temper.

Eren did not move. His tunic was still dry from the safety of where he sat, where the ceiling was intact and the pedestal rose high above the rising water. Jean waded toward the silhouette, but he paused when he saw a large leaf drift past him. The theatre company of beetles sat atop it, using clovers as oars. They hummed along, and little Beetle-Jean blew Actual-Jean a quick kiss before they floated on toward the passage leading to the staircase.

The squirrels sniggered, but Jean took a moment to gather his composure. The beetles had provided a distraction, allowing him time to put his temper away for now and settle back down on apologizing.

“Eren,” Jean started. “About before, I shouldn’t have… I didn’t mean what I said.”

Eren turned his head slowly until Jean slid under his gaze. His eyes looked electric, yellow and shocking every time they reflected the series of brilliant white flashes, like the storm outside had originated from within them. Jean swallowed, remembering how frightening Eren could be. He was a _god_ , after all.

But Eren was a god without powers… right? That’s why Jean was apologizing.

“I mean, you obviously wouldn’t choose this,” Jean continued. “I’m just- okay, I’m just gonna say it. Here it goes,” Jean said, taking a deep breath.

Eren stared at him, ignoring the squirrels on his head completely.

“I- What I’m trying to say is that I,” Jean took another breath, “Whew, okay, hold on a second.” Jean was feeling nervous, so he shook it out. The water splashed around him and Eren watched, his face blank, as Jean began to stretch an arm over his head. The squirrels ducked.

“What are you doing?” Eren asked.

“Limbering up.”

“Limbering up for what?”

“An apology,” said Jean, doing a few squats in the water.

“You never limbered up before,” said Eren, managing a frown. “Why now? Is the sixth time special?”

Jean stopped mid-twist. “What?”

“You didn’t need to limber up the first five times you apologized,” said Eren.

Jean untwisted. “I’ve apologized five times?”

“Yes.”

“You _counted_?”

“It’s not like I was counting as we went along,” Eren scoffed, like Jean was stupid to think that. “But I can count by going through my memory.”

“That’s super creepy,” said Jean.

Eren turned the rest of his body toward Jean. “How is remembering things super creepy?” he asked.

“Well it’s not, unless you remember absolutely everything. Like, can you tell me the exact reason I apologized?

“Which time?”

“I don’t know… the third time?”

“After you sneezed in my face.”

“See? That’s super creepy!” Jean exclaimed, splashing his hands up to his head and getting the squirrels wet.

“Hey!” shouted the squirrels.

“Normal human beings do not have that good of a memory,” Jean said.

“I’m not-!” Lightning flickered across Eren’s sour expression as he bit back his words. Jean heard his own mistake and splashed forward quickly, hesitating before putting his hands up on the pedestal.

“I’m not saying you’re not a human being,” he told Eren.

“But you’re saying I’m not normal?” asked Eren.

“Well,” said Jean. “You are abnormal as fuck. Wait, I mean-”

“This is the worst apology ever,” said a squirrel.

“Eren, stop glaring! You’re making Jean nervous,” said another squirrel.

“Yeah, the poor kid can’t stop stuttering.”

“Guys, shut up, I’m talking,” said Jean, hearing nothing but obnoxious squeaks. “Listen, Eren, what I’m trying to say is… well, the reason this is so hard is because it’s the first time I’m really apologizing to you about something serious. Like super serious.”

Eren saw Jean’s earnest expression and felt unexpectedly awkward. “You’re making this too big of a deal,” he said, fidgeting.

“No, I’m not,” said Jean. “I want you to know that I didn’t mean all the stuff I said.”

“It’s fine, I get it,” Eren said.

“Stop being a stubborn ass and just listen.”

“Why should I?” Eren snapped.

“Because I was angry, and I’m stuck in here against my will, and so I took it out on you. But you’ve had it way worse, haven’t you?”

“Yes I have, you jackass.”

“Exactly! I take it all back. About you not trying to get out. I’m not saying you’re completely powerless, because like whoa, my shackles are gone and the ladybug and spider vanished-”

“They didn’t-”

“I know you think they ran, but what I’m saying is that even if you have a little bit of power, maybe-”

“I don’t.”

Jean took a deep breath. He wanted Eren to understand, so the two of them could maybe figure out what was going on, but right now the apology was the important thing. And Jean was bumbling down the wrong path yet again.

“Fine,” Jean said, going along with Eren’s stubbornness. They would deal with that issue later. “But clearly you wouldn’t keep yourself here on purpose. So what I’m trying to say is that I’m sorry.”

A deep belt of thunder drowned out the end of Jean’s apology. The noise vibrated through the mountain, and the rising water around Jean’s waist shuddered in response.

“What?” asked Eren.

“Dammit thunder!” shouted Jean, and another roll of it shook the temple. “I said I’m really sorry.”

“Your real name is Maury?” asked Eren.

“No, I’m sorry!”

“Safari?”

“Sor- damn thunder!”

“Boy wonder.”

“AAAHH!” Jean screamed in frustration.

The squirrels covered their tiny ears. Eren burst into laughter, holding his knees and rocking back on the pedestal.

“Just kidding,” Eren confessed. “I heard you the first time.”

Jean gaped up at him. “You’re horrible.”

“I’m not as horrible as you,” Eren laughed.

A flash of lightning illuminated Eren’s beaming face, and Jean’s heart throbbed heavily.

“Hey, uh… Are you having a hard time breathing?” Jean asked him, rubbing his chest through his damp shirt. His heart gave another wretched thump. “Stop laughing already,” he said when Eren did not stop.

Jean lifted his arms back and then shoved them forward through the water, splashing at Eren and the pedestal.

“What the hell! I’m all wet, you asshole!” Eren yelped.

It was Jean’s turn to laugh, but then Eren threw himself off the pedestal, pushing Jean under water. Jean choked and pushed the weight off of him, breaking the surface and sputtering in the chilly air.

“Are you trying to kill me?” Jean coughed, wiping his face. He looked around at the dark temple, but he couldn’t even see an outline of anyone else. The squirrels had jumped off his head and were now shivering on top of the pedestal, skinny and pitiful beneath their dripping fur.

Jean spun around, looking for Eren. The dark water was empty.

“…Eren?” he called out.

Something grabbed the chain between Jean’s ankles and pulled him under, but not before Jean let out the loudest, highest shriek any of them had ever heard. He glimpsed the group of squirrels hiding their mouths with their claws, laughing at the sound he had made.

Everything went slow and silent uder the water. Jean's found Eren and grabbed his thin wrists, pulling them both up. The storm sounded farther away now, but the rain was still coming down heavily.

“What was that? Do you _want_ me to kill you?” Jean asked. In the darkness he could barely see Eren’s face. Both his cheeks were puffed out and his lips were pursed.

Eren smirked and squirted water out of his mouth, the stream hitting Jean right between the eyes and trailing down his torso.

“Suicidal bastard!” Jean yelled, releasing Eren to wipe his face and then lunging toward him again. “I’ll actually kill you!”

“I’m immortal,” Eren laughed, splashing away.

“But not invincible,” Jean replied, swimming after him.

“Get him, Jean!” shouted the squirrels.

“Drown him like a rat, Eren!” twittered the birds.

“Drowning is a bit extreme, don’t you think?” Eren called back at them, too distracted to realize he was using human-tongue.

Jean, thinking Eren was talking to him, replied, “That’s rich, coming from someone who shoved me underwater and nearly knocked me unconscious.”

“Stop being so sensitive,” said Eren. He shrieked and laughed when Jean sent another series of splashes at him, and he moved around the room in a large circle. Jean caught onto the simple pattern and cut a corner, coming close enough to grab at Eren’s necklace.

Eren’s foot landed on a submerged pile of golden coins, and he slipped backwards. Jean pulled the necklace and saved him from going under, and Eren grabbed Jean’s arms, making a pained sound as the string dug into his neck. Jean tugged again, surprised by how strong the thin strand holding the key was, before he remembered the spells woven into it.

“Ouch! Will you stop it already? My neck’s going to break,” Eren said, using his grip on Jean’s forearms to pull himself up to a standing position.

Jean quickly let go of the key, but Eren did not release his hold on Jean’s arms.

“What?” Jean asked, noticing the mischievous tug of Eren’s lips. He drew his shackled hands up to his chest, but Eren didn’t let go and followed the movement, stepping closer.

“You’re soaked,” said Eren.

“Yeah, so are you,” Jean retorted, not liking the way his heart was behaving at the moment.

Eren’s eyes traveled down to Jean’s lips, and then past them, lowering until they were focusing in on the rise and fall of his chest.

 _Oh god_ , thought Jean. _Can he hear it? Shut up, heart! SHUT UP!_

“Weird,” Eren said.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Jean tried to sound angry, but his voice came out a lot more breathy than he would like to admit. He was feeling the same dizziness he had felt in the hallway. Eren let go of Jean’s arms but didn’t remove his touch, trailing his fingertips slowly up to his shoulders. Jean didn’t move, didn’t breathe, didn’t do _anything_ as Eren traced his collarbone, then passed over his arms that were still covering his hammering heart, and then ran down his torso and around his hips beneath the water.

Jean gasped, and Eren paused, frowning.

“You’re shivering,” he told Jean. “Are you cold?”

Jean swallowed. “Uh…?” he said. He was actually feeling really hot.

A squirrel squeaked at them from across the room. Eren looked between them and Jean, appearing startled. He tightened an arm around Jean’s waist, and Jean made a disgusted sound but didn’t push away.

“Eren,” he mumbled. “Let go.”

“Something’s wrong,” said Eren. He clicked something at the shivering squirrels, and they chirped a reply.

“M’fine,” said Jean. Eren was leading him through the water, out one of the archways and toward the spiral staircase. When they reached it, Eren sat him down on one of the steps above the water and gripped his shoulders.

“Jean, what’s wrong?” he asked.

The stairs felt like they were moving back and forth. Instead of answering, Jean closed his eyes, feeling nauseous and trying not to shiver too much.

“Jean?” Eren was sounding desperate. “You’re not getting… sick, are you?”

“Ugh,” said Jean. “Probably… Yeah, actually. I feel kind of horrible.”

“Oh,” said Eren. “Oh god.”

Jean cracked his eyes open. The squirrels were swimming toward them down the hallway, but the sight of the water sloshing around made Jean want to throw up, so he closed them again.

“I jus’ need some sleep,” Jean said.

Eren didn't answer. After a moment, Jean opened his eyes again and saw that Eren was gone, and he was sitting all alone. The squirrels made it to the stairs and ran up past him.

“Figures,” Jean muttered. He started to pull himself up the stairs and paused, feeling his stomach clench and his heart pound painfully in his chest. The water was climbing the stairs after him, and he managed to crawl up two more before he slumped and heaved.

Jean was not surprised when he threw up bile. When was the last time he’d eaten? His stomach clenched again and he gagged, coughing until he couldn’t get anything else out.

“Gross,” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

Someone gasped and Jean looked back. Eren was standing there, chest deep in water now and staring at the vomit. Behind him stood a beautiful black-eyed buck, with branches of pine between its antlers and blankets of moss across its back. Eren was holding a bundle of moss, leaves, and a chalice above his own head, and he looked like he was about to cry.

“What are you staring at,” Jean said, hating the weakness of his muscles.

“Are you okay?” Eren asked, his voice cracking.

“Do I look okay?!” Jean snapped.

Eren stood there frozen, unsure, until the buck gave him a helpful nudge from behind. Eren rushed forward and past Jean, disappearing up the stairs.

“What the hell,” Jean said to himself. He looked back at the buck, which blinked solemnly up at him. The intelligence in its eyes reminded Jean of Bob the boar. “You don’t happen to speak human, do you?” he asked it.

The buck swayed its head back and forth, careful not to drop the pine branches.

“Great,” said Jean. Footsteps came pounding down the stairs again, and Eren was back, crouching beside Jean on the step anxiously.

“Can I touch you?” Eren asked.

Jean could have sworn his fever skyrocketed. “W-What?” he stuttered, averting his gaze back toward the buck. The buck averted its gaze bashfully as well.

“I’m going to carry you up to the room,” said Eren. “Is that okay?”

“You had no problem touching me without permission before,” mumbled Jean.

“What?” Eren asked,

“I said I can get there myself!” Jean shouted. He pulled himself up on wobbly legs and began to climb again. The steps beneath his feet swam and dipped and dodged. Jean cursed, and felt his balance tip one way completely.

“Hrumph,” came a groan from behind him. Jean stopped falling, and he felt hot breath on his lower back.

“Hrrngg ffrum,” Eren said, thanking the buck behind Jean.

The buck kept its nose steadily on Jean’s back, helping him up the stairs until they reached the top. Apparently, all the animals and insects and reptiles in the temple had either left outside to avoid the flood downstairs, or they had climbed up here and were now watching Eren frantically make Jean a bed. Jean leaned heavily on the buck’s neck while Eren laid the pine branches from its antlers down on the floor. He stuffed leaves in any gaps as best he could, and then spread out the blankets of moss over the top.

“Since when are you a bed-making expert?” asked Jean.

“I’m not,” said Eren, standing up and pointing to the buck. “Bucky is.”

Jean eyed the buck before hesitantly lying down on the bed, which turned out to be the most comfortable bed he had ever laid down on in his life.

“Wow. Thanks Becky,” mumbled Jean.

“Bucky,” corrected Eren.

“It’s actually Bucksworth,” said the buck.

“But Bucky fits you much better than Bucksworth,” Dove cooed, fluttering down to rest on Bucky’s antlers.

Eren was shivering at this point, cold and wet just like everyone else. Jean was shivering the worst of all, and Eren looked around for something to put over him.

“You should probably get his clothes off to dry,” said Dove. “Yours, too.”

“Oh, right,” said Eren. “Jean-”

But Jean was already passed out, and his shirt and vest were crumpled in a soaking pile next to him. Eren carefully removed his trousers and laid the clothes out in a corner, knowing they would takes ages to dry without the sun. He went back to Jean and covered him with a layer of moss.

“You should probably take your tunic off, too…. What are you doing?” asked Dove.

Eren was leaning over the moss blankets with his ear to Jean’s mouth. “He’s not breathing right!” he whispered.

Lizard let go of the ceiling where she’d been hanging and fell down beside Dove, scrambling to stay on the antler. “Let him resssst, Eren,” advised Lizard, finally finding a good grip.

“What’s wrong with him?” Eren said, sitting up on his heels.

“He’sss ssick,” said Lizard. She turned to the squirrels. “You’re already wet, so go find sssomething to catch thhhe vomit.”

Two squirrels scampered off down the stairs.

“He’s sick?” repeated Eren. “But sickness leads to death!”

“You’ve seen sickness and death so many times,” cooed Dove. “Aren’t you used to it by now?”

Lizard smacked Dove with her purple tail. “Are you alwaysss an idiot, or jusst when I’m around?” she hissed.

“Ow! I’m just saying, shouldn't Eren be used to things around him dying? Ow!” Dove rubbed the crown of his head with his wing.

“He’sss not going to die,” said Lizard. “Jean jussst hass the sstomach flu.”

“It wasn’t me,” said a blue jay. “I’m clean.”

“Not thhe bird flu, jusst a sstomach flu,” said Lizard, rolling her eyes. “Humanss get it sssometimess.”

Eren looked up at her with big, watery green eyes. “Is there a cure?”

Lizard opened her mouth, but was cut off by a chorus of other suggestions.

“Music has healing powers,” tweeted Dove.

“Heat isss good too,” a rattled snake recommended.

“Nuts!” shouted one of the squirrels that had just come back from downstairs with a ceramic jug for Jean to puke in.

“Licking always works,” said Bucky.

“He’s not wounded, you idiot,” said the squirrel.

“At least I didn’t suggest feeding him something he’ll throw up right away,” said Bucky.

“At least we’re not fat!” joined in some other squirrels.

“I may be fat, but at least I’m not ugly,” said Bucky. “And I can lose weight.”

“Vibrations,” buzzed the bees from the stairs. “It’s a frequency thing.”

“I hear love conquers all!” piped up a beetle.

“Eren isn’t in love,” scoffed Dove. “Right, Eren?”

Eren, however, was not paying attention. Jean had just woken up and started puking into the ceramic jug, and Eren kneeled beside him, obviously unsure of what to do, so he simply wrung his hands and watched Jean gag. Jean coughed and then fell back onto the bed, and Eren tucked the moss in around him gently.

“I’m not a kid, Eren,” said Jean, swatting away Eren’s hands.

“Well I’m older than you so shut up and lie still.”

“Old geezer,” said Jean, halfheartedly trying to wiggle out of the moss blanket.

“I am not a geezer,” said Eren.

“I bet you fart dust,” said Jean.

“What the actual fuck are you talking about?” asked Eren.

“Because you’re so old,” Jean chuckled weakly. “Get it?”

“Go back to sleep or I will kick your ass,” Eren said, wiping Jean’s mouth with the end of his soaked tunic.

“I’ve never been kicked in the ass by a god before,” mumbled Jean, shaking still. His forehead was glistening with sweat. “Must be lovely.”

“I’ve kicked your ass plenty of times,” said Eren. Jean shrugged and snuggled down deeper into the bed, and Eren didn’t look away until he started snoring lightly.

“That’s definitely not love. _Right_ , Eren?” Dove said, urgently this time.

“Huh? Love?” asked Eren, preoccupied. “Is that the cure?”

“Definitely not,” said Dove, while the beetles cried, “You bet your bottom dollar it is!”

“He needss ressst,” said Lizard. “And water. Lotsss of water. And warmthhh.”

“Called it,” whispered the rattlesnake.

“But what about the food?” asked a squirrel. “For when he stops throwing up,” it quickly added, shooting a glare at Bucky.

“And songs!” tweeted the birds.

“Aromas also help,” buzzed the bees. “Sweet things.”

“Saliva,” said Bucky.

“Okay,” Eren said decidedly. He stood up and put his hands on his hips. “We will do all those things!”

“Yes!” said Bucky.

“Except saliva.”

“Oh.”

The rain continued outside, but it did not deter the critters from gathering the most beautiful flowers, tasty berries, and nutritious nuts. Water was not hard to gather because of the rain, and soon the inside of the upstairs room looked like an indoor garden. Flowers were tied and hung in long strands from the ceiling, offering sweet scents and vibrant colors. Bucky laid down beside Jean for warmth, and Eren sat on the other side, ready with water and the ceramic jug whenever Jean needed it. The birds provided delightful songs, while the bees, dragonflies, and beetles sent good vibrations throughout the room.

The squirrels were hard at work as well, stacking different roots and edible plants beneath the windowsill for later. Fireflies provided a comforting light, but it still was not enough. Jean’s temperature was so high that Eren had to continuously shoo the snakes off his body, which were curling there for warmth.

“I don’t know what to do!” Eren said to Lizard. “He’s dying, isn’t he?”

“You haven’t tried licking him yet,” said Bucky.

“He is not wounded!” shouted the squirrels, annoyed at having to repeat themselves.

“I’ll do it,” said Eren.

“It won’t do anything,” said the squirrels.

“It doesn’t hurt to try,” said Bucky.

“Okay… here goes nothing,” said Eren, thinking back on how Jean had to prepare himself for his apology. This was much harder than that, in Eren’s opinion.

He took a breath and held it in, leaning forward until his face was above Jean’s. But then he stopped, letting out his breath and looking up.

“Where exactly am I supposed to lick him?” asked Eren.

“Wherever it hurts,” said Bucky.

Eren looked back down. Jean’s entire expression looked pained, but he wasn’t actually physically injured.

“I’ll start with the forehead,” Eren decided out loud, picking the spot at random. He lowered himself, closer and closer, almost there, he couldn’t believe he was actually doing this, and…

Jean groaned and opened his eyes.

“Outta the way, idiot,” he said, shoving Eren’s face to the side with his bandaged palm. “I’m gonna hurl. Where’s the jug?”

Eren handed it to him with one hand, hiding his face in the other, mortified.

Jean finished puking and gave the jug back, oblivious to everything around him. He rolled over and smooshed his face into Bucky’s warm side. Bucky looked absolutely revolted. Once Jean was asleep, Eren relaxed, though he was looking almost as feverish as Jean was.

“Whew! Licking is probably not the way to go,” said Eren, fanning himself.

“Eren,” Dove said seriously. “You sure are doing a lot for Jean.”

“Well yeah. He’s sick,” said Eren.

“But was all this really necessary?” asked Dove, gesturing around the room.

Eren looked at all the flowers and food and then at Dove. “He’s sick,” he deadpanned.

Lizard climbed on Eren’s shoulder. “Don’t lisssten to Dove, Eren. He jusst worriesss too much.”

“What is he worried about?” Eren asked, getting angry. “If you have something to say, say it.”

“I’m just worried that you’re forgetting our conversation about love,” said Dove.

“I remember it. What about it?”

“You appear to be falling,” said Dove.

“Falling where?” asked Eren, confusion mixing with his anger.

“In love,” said Dove.

“I don’t love Jean!” said Eren. “I don’t even like Jean. I’m not falling. I won’t.”

“Then what happened to the new plan we talked about?” asked Dove.

Eren motioned to Jean with both his hands and said, “He’s sick!”

“Leave him alone,” Lizard hissed at Dove from Eren’s shoulder. “He knowsss what he’ss doing.”

“Actually-” Eren started, but was cut off by a groan emitting from Jean.

Eren leaned forward, helping Jean sit up. His hair was sticking up on one side, causing the squirrels to cringe.

“Woah,” Jean said, grinning at Eren. Then he looked around and, noticing his surroundings for the first time since getting sick, he said, “ _Woah_. I didn’t know we had a greenhouse.”

“I think he’s delirious,” said Bucky.

“His skin is still really warm,” said Eren, peeling Jean off of him in disgust.

“Are you guys speaking moose?” asked Jean. He looked at Bucky in the eyes very seriously and said, “Moo.”

“Buck isn’t a moose, Jean,” said Eren. “Let’s get you back to sleep.”

“And a moossse isss not a cow,” added Lizard.

“Sssth sssss,” said Jean, making faces at Lizard. Lizard stuck her tongue out and scampered around to Eren’s other shoulder.

“Your pet gecko is a coward,” said Jean, letting Eren push him down and tuck him back in.

“She’s not my pet,” said Eren. “She’s a friend.”

“Weren’t those other ones your friends?” asked Jean. “That ladybug and the spider and those pigs?”

“And Trevor,” added a blue jay.

“Yes,” Eren said flatly.

“But you-”

“I know,” Eren snapped, cutting Jean off. “I messed up, alright? If I could find them and apologize, I would.”

“Heyyy!” Jean grinned over Eren’s shoulder. “That was fast. You guys decided to come to my party, too?”

Ladybug, Black Widow, and Trevor were looking at Jean worriedly from the windowsill. They panicked as soon as Eren spotted them, and Black Widow and Ladybug bumped into each other before vanishing over the ledge into the rain. Trevor squawked and slipped on the wet stone, bumbling back to his feet before flying after them.

“Hey, stop!” Eren called. “Come back! I’m sorry!”

A moment passed and then Trevor peaked out from the side of the window. Eren sighed in relief, motioning for them to come back inside.

“Eren,” Jean whispered. Eren looked down and saw Jean grinning up at him like the delirious idiot he was.

“What is it?” Eren asked.

Jean pulled Eren down by the back of his neck. Eren had to plant his hands on either side of him and bend his elbows so he wouldn’t crash painfully into Jean’s skull. Then Jean pulled himself up a bit and pecked Eren on the lips.

“Don’t forget to give them their gift bags,” Jean said, smiling. He let go of Eren and fell back onto his bed of moss, falling asleep seconds later.

 Eren stared at Jean, still positioned over him.

“Eren?” asked Dove.

Eren squeaked, shoving off from the ground and scrambling away on his elbows and heels.

“I’ve heard of delayed reactions, but that was my first time seeing one in real life,” said a beetle. “How dramatic.”

Eren was breathing hard, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“An overreaction as well,” said a second beetle. “He’s kissed you before, Eren.”

“I know, shut up!” Eren covered his face with his hands.

“But you’re freaking out,” said the first beetle.

“I know,” Eren said, looking between his fingers at the sleeping human on the moss, framed by strands of flowers hanging around him. “I can’t do this.”

“Eren?” Black Widow slowly crawled over to him.

Eren saw her and wanted to cry. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice coming out as a sob. “I’m so, so sorry.”

Trevor carried Ladybug over and they perched on the shoulder that wasn’t occupied by Lizard.

“We know, Eren. But you were being kind of a bully. You can’t get rid of us whenever we do something you don’t like,” said Ladybug.

“I know,” said Eren. “I’m sorry.”

“You have to stop being so selfish,” said Black Widow.

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“And paid vacations would be nice every once in a while,” said Trevor.

“Oh my gosh Trevor, shut up!” said a blue jay from the beams.

Eren rubbed his eyes and laughed. “You don’t get paid to be here in the first place,” he said.

“That’s because we choose to be here, stupid,” said Ladybug. Trevor shrugged.

“You guys are the best,” said Eren, wishing he could hug them without crushing their brains out.

“We know,” said Black Widow. “Now that apologies are over and lessons have been learned, what did you mean by ‘you can’t do this’?”

Eren glanced at Dove nervously. “I meant… we have this plan…”

“What plan,” Black Widow demanded.

“A marvelous plan,” interjected Dove, puffing his chest out. “Eren is going to engage in casual sex without falling in love.”

“And what the hell do you hope to accomplish with that?” asked Ladybug.

“Love is a human feeling,” said Dove.

“Love is an everything feeling!” shouted Ladybug, momentarily losing control of her wings. “Why deprive yourself of it?”

“Ladybug,” Dove said, his voice strained. “If I may have a word with you in private. You too, Black Widow.”

“Whatever you say can be said in front of Eren!” hollered Ladybug. She was getting quite heated.

Eren nodded. “Yeah! Say it in front of me!”

“Wait, Ladybug. Let’s hear what Dove has to say,” said Black Widow.

“Why should we?” asked Ladybug.

“Because I’m curious,” said Black Widow. She grabbed Ladybug and shot a web up to Bucky’s antler.

“Sure, sure, go right ahead,” said Bucky. “I love being treated like furniture.”

“You’re leaving me out?” Trevor asked as the spider and ladybug huddled behind Dove’s wing.

“They’re leaving me out, too,” Eren said, but he got distracted again when Jean started mumbling in his sleep. Eren went and patted his glistening forehead with his tunic, while Dove whispered coos and secrets a couple feet away.

“Oh!” said Ladybug.

“Alright,” said Black Widow. “So, Eren, let’s get back to- Oh my goodness! Quick, someone draw a picture.”

Eren stopped drying Jean’s forehead and scowled up at her. “I’m only doing it because he’s dying.”

“For thhhe lassst time, he’ss not,” Lizard started, but then she sighed. “Nevermind.”

Black Widow looked like she was about to burst from all the things she wanted to squeal, but she somehow contained herself and moved on. “Okay, sorry. Where was I?”

“You were about to tell usss how bad Dove’sss idea iss,” said Lizard.

“Oh, no no. I love his idea,” said Black Widow.

“Me too,” said Ladybug.

“What?” asked Lizard, glancing at Dove in suspicion. Dove was looking at his wing vaguely.

“Yes, a _splendid_ idea,” said Black Widow. “So Eren, you can’t do what exactly?”

Eren sat back from Jean and wrung his tunic nervously. “I-I can’t seem to… initiate?”

“Then we just have to get Jean to initiate,” said Black Widow.

“Thhhat won’t work,” said Lizard.

“There are ways,” cooed Dove. “For instance, singing.”

“Nest-building!” twittered a blue jay.

“Colors!” buzzed the bees.

“But mostly singing,” said Dove.

“And body language,” said Bucky.

“Scents!” buzzed the bees.

“The most important is singing, though,” said Dove.

“Ahem,” said Black Widow, stepping forward. Everyone quieted down. “As the most experienced of the group, I can confidently say that the best way to let someone know you’re ready for whatever is by dancing.”

“How is dancing relevant?” asked a beetle.

“Oh believe me, it’s relevant,” Black Widow said ominously. “It could make the difference between life and death.”

“We’re talking about sex, not Russian roulette,” said a pigeon.

“If it’s that important, teach me,” Eren said to Black Widow.

“You got it,” said Black Widow. “So you just kind bend your knees like this, see? And then… move up and down really fast, like ThIS! AnD yOu’LL geT PreTTy dIZzy But iT WorKS!”

Eren stared at Black Widow as she shook violently up and down, until eventually she got tired and had to stop.

“Are you sure that’s not just a spider thing?” Eren asked hopefully.

“I’ve seen humans do it,” Ladybug chimed in. “They call it lurking.”

“Twerking,” Bucky corrected her. “Don’t lurk, Eren. You’ll freak him out.”

“I don’t want to lurk _or_ twerk,” said Eren, sounding hopeless. “Maybe I should just ask him to have sex with me.”

“But you can’t!” insisted Black Widow. “Things might end badly if you don’t send a signal first. One time a male climbed on my web without dancing, and I was caught so off guard that I turned around and ate him!”

“Don’t get all bashful after telling a story like that!” Ladybug said, horrified.

Black Widow was hiding her blush behind two spindly legs. “But it was so embarrassing! I mean, I know Jean’s not a female spider or anything, but I don’t want the same thing to happen to you!”

“Okay, but if that doesn’t work, then what?” asked Eren.

“Colors!” buzzed the bees.

“Actually,” said a blue jay, “I know lots of birds that attract others with their feathers. If we dress you in a way that Jean likes, he might go for it.”

“Jean likes treasure,” suggested Eren. “I still don’t like the treasure, but Jean did mention how I should at least do something with it.”

“Might as well wear it for him while you twerk!” said Ladybug.

“And if that doesn’t work, you should try body language,” said Bucky. “You gotta give lots of little signs. Like sticking your butt out and batting your eyelashes.”

“Isssn’t thhhat what female deersss do?” asked Lizard.

“Oh… you want to be the male?” asked Bucky, turning to Eren.

Eren was hiding his face in his hands again. He was beyond words, so he simply shrugged.

“Well in that case, you have to fight another male for dominance,” said Bucky. “Whoever wins takes the prize.”

“That’s a pretty crude way of phrasing it,” said Trevor. “Besides, who else is going to compete for Jean?”

“Well, Jean’s a male,” said Dove. “So can’t Eren and Jean just fight it out, and then go crazy?”

“You guys, _please_!” Eren said.

“Would you rather stick your butt out, then?” Dove asked.

“No! I don't know, ugh!”

Dove held out his wing and said, “Alright, so we have twerking in costume, fighting or seducing, whichever one he decides, and we can’t forget singing.”

“I don’t want to sing,” said Eren. “I don't know any songs.”

“Just make it up as you go,” said Dove.

“Ugh,” said Jean, rolling over. He coughed dryly, feeling around for water. The animals stopped discussing mating rituals, and the birds quickly began singing again.

Eren crawled over and gave him a chalice filled with rainwater. “Um,” he said awkwardly. “How are you feeling?”

“Fit as a fiddle,” said Jean.

“What’s a fiddle?” asked Eren.

“It makes music,” said Jean. “Real music. Not this birdsong crap.”

A pigeon stopped tweeting and lifted its tail over Jean’s head.

“Wait! Wait, it was a joke,” said Jean, narrowly escaping the white splotch of poop by leaning into Eren. Eren whistled up a scolding, and the pigeon ruffled its feathers indignantly before flying off through the window.

“You’re still hot,” said Eren, feeling Jean’s forehead.

“Thank you,” Jean said smoothly.

“And you smell like throw up.”

“Thanks,” Jean said, less smoothly. “Where’s your head thing?”

Eren’s hands flew up to his hair. “What? It’s not there?”

“No,” said Jean, frowning. “I didn’t notice until now, sorry. You must have lost it in the water.”

“Why are you apologizing?” Eren asked.

“Cuz I feel bad. I know you like that thing,” said Jean. He lifted the leaf to his mouth, draining the water. Eren didn’t know where to look, so he kept his gaze trained on the rain falling outside the window.

“Sing to him!” whispered Dove.

 _No!_ Eren mouthed back.

“Can I ask you a question?” Jean said, making Eren jump.

“What? Uh, sure?”

“Why did you accept that deal?” Jean asked, sitting up more and reaching for a strand of flowers hanging from the ceiling. Eren tried not to stare at his shimmering chest. “The ancient one that keeps you from shifting, I mean.”

Eren blinked. “The deal with the offerings? Why are you asking this now?”

“It’s been on my mind,” said Jean. He sat back against Bucky and started looping the flowers around each other. “And I kind of want to understand you more. So we don’t, you know. Keep fighting.”

“Oh.” Eren looked down at his golden bracelets and thought. “Because shifting was a pain. It sucks growing so huge when you’re stuck in such a small place.”

“I can relate,” said Jean, smirking down at the moss.

“No you can’t,” said Eren, totally missing the joke.

Jean tried again. “Speaking of small places, where are my trousers?”

“They’re drying over there,” said Eren, missing the joke a second time.

Jean sighed. “Forget it. So that’s it?”

“What’s it?”

“You didn’t like being cramped?”

“No. Would you?”

“Well no, but that can’t be the only reason you agreed.”

“Why not?” Eren asked. “If anything, they were doing me a favor. Not the other way around.”

“It didn’t have anything to do with the actual offerings?” Jean asked, swatting a firefly away from his bundle of flowers.

“Okay, sure. I like receiving things,” said Eren.

“We both know that’s not true. You hate treasure,” Jean said.

“Fine,” Eren said, knowing Jean would never let it go. “I think I sort of like getting visitors. Maybe.”

Jean stopped weaving the flowers and looked up, surprised that Eren had actually told him the truth. “Oh. Wait, so you settled for visitors once a year? Are you an idiot?”

“Excuse me?”

“For the spell to work, didn’t both sides have to agree on the deal?” Jean asked.

“Yeah? So?”

“You realize how much leverage you have over people?” Jean asked. “They’re terrified of you!”

“Yeah, I know. Thanks for reminding me.”

“No, Eren, you don’t get what I’m saying. Whoever made the deal with you probably would have agreed to almost anything to get you to stop shifting. And you agreed to _once a year_?”

“Well what was I supposed to do?”

“Uh, make the offering more than an annual thing? Seriously, it could’ve been every day if you wanted it to be!”

“Well it’s too late now,” Eren said, crossing his arms. “The spell cast on the deal is forever.”

“You must have been desperate for visitors.”

Eren drew a deep breath. “I wasn’t _desperate_. They were just the first people to come to the temple since I was imprisoned,” he said. “I hadn’t seen anyone in over a century, okay? I wasn’t thinking straight.”

Jean pictured Eren greeting people after all those years of isolation, and his stomach twisted. “You had the animals to talk to, right?” he asked hopefully.

“No. I didn’t learn the languages until I was two centuries old. I met this boar who knows human speech-”

“What the hell?” Jean growled.

“I’m not lying to you about that, I swear. His name is Bob.”

“No, I mean, what the hell!” Jean shouted.

“Great. You’re mad,” said Eren. He was tired of fighting.

“No I’m not.”           

“Then why do you look like you want to punch me?”

“I don’t want to punch you, I want to punch the situation!”

“That’s stupid,” said Eren.

“No, it’s complete bullshit!” said Jean.

Eren narrowed his eyes. “It’s not bullshit. I’m telling the truth.”

“This whole thing makes me sick,” Jean said.

“Wait!” Eren’s eyes darted around for the ceramic jug.

“Eren, stop. I meant figuratively puking.”

“Oh.”

“But seriously, what were you thinking? Did isolation kill your brain cells?”

“No. I was just tired of myself.”

Jean eyed him meaningfully. “That’s called loneliness, you know.”

Eren shot an irritated look at Jean. “I am not lonely.”

“Not anymore, you mean,” Jean said, enjoying the way the conversation had turned.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Because you’re getting fidgety. It’s funny.”

“Glad I could be your source of entertainment,” Eren said.

“You aren’t lonely anymore, right?” asked Jean.

“No.”

“I’m not so horrible after all, huh?” Jean said, waggling his eyebrows.

“No, you’re pretty horrible,” he said.

“Aw, you think I’m pretty?” Jean asked, choosing to ignore the ‘horrible’ part.

“Well you’re not _ugly_.”

“You’re not denying it.”

“I think a lot of things are pretty,” said Eren, quickly picking up one of the flowers that had fallen from Jean’s hands. “Poison ivy, for example.”

“Don’t compare me with poison ivy.”

Sparkling jade orbs flickered in Jean’s direction and then back to the flower. “You’re blushing, Jean,” said Eren.

“I’m sick,” said Jean. He saw the white pearls peak out from under those smirking ruby lips, and he couldn’t help but grin awkwardly as well. “But you’re blushing too, dumbass. Ouch!” A thorn bit into Jean’s thumb, and he started bleeding.

“Serves you right,” said Eren.

“What did I do?”

“You were prying into my past again.”

Jean shot him a glare and began wiping his thumb on the moss.

“Here,” Eren said, scooting closer. He wrapped his hand around the shackle on Jean’s wrist and lifted his hand to his mouth.

Jean nearly passed out again when those ruby lips and pearly white teeth voluntarily slipped over his bleeding thumb. He felt Eren’s warm tongue press against it, and then it was over too fast. Eren pulled back and released Jean’s wet thumb from his mouth.

“What are you doing?” Jean asked, his voice shrill.

“Licking,” said Eren. “Bucky said it helps heal wounds.”

“Bucky,” Jean repeated, remembering the warm animal he was leaning against. “Right. Healing.”

“Are you okay?” Eren asked. He let go of Jean’s wrist and felt his forehead. “Do you want to sleep some more?”

“Maybe,” Jean said, knowing he would never get back to sleep in his current state. He looked down at the circle of flowers in his uninjured hand. “Oh. Hang on, let me snap that thorn off.”

“What’s that?” Eren asked, watching Jean curiously bite off the thorn. Jean then gave a lopsided grin and placed the flowers on Eren’s head.

“Ta-da! Because you looked weird without something on your head,” said Jean.

Eren touched the crown of flowers and looked at Jean. Sure, the ex-thief was currently sick as shit and had worse bed-head hair than a porcupine, but something in his expression made Eren’s throat close up.

“This is so dumb,” Eren croaked. He fell forward and wrapped his arms around Jean, squeezing as tight as he could because he knew he wouldn’t crush his brains out. He buried his face in Jean’s scent and mumbled, “You’re the worst.”

“Are you going to cry?” Jean asked, returning the hug.

“No.”

“Dumbass, I can feel you crying.”

“No you can’t. That’s your sweat.”

“Okay, okay,” said Jean. He looked around at the firefly-lit room, at all the animals falling asleep around them, at the bed and the flowers and the glittering insect wings and then at the rain outside, and thought for a moment that being stuck with Eren really wasn’t that bad.

“Hey Jean?” Eren mumbled, his voice sounding tired.

“Yeah?” Jean replied sleepily.

“Your dick is hard.”

“Nothing I can do about that at the moment, Eren, so please ignore it.”

Eren suddenly felt a million little eyes on them and said, “I guess you’re right. Sorry for bringing it up.”

“No problem.”

“Sorry for bringing it up both ways, I mean.”

“Either go to sleep or keep crying, jackass.”

“Sleep sounds good,” said Eren. “Should I move?”

“Will I get you sick?” asked Jean. " _Can_ you get sick?"

“It hasn’t happened before,” said Eren.

“Then do whatever the hell you want,” said Jean, but he didn't let go of Eren. Eren smiled against Jean’s skin and closed his eyes, wondering distantly if he was feeling the rise and fall of Jean’s chest, or if it was Bucky’s lungs giving them a rhythm to follow as they fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: sorry for the lack of frick frack but come on guys they can't fuck IN A ROOM FULL OF ANIMALS. I also made a stupid little [playlist](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/post/87909181886/jeans-treasure-erens-slave-songs-that) of the songs I listen to while writing this fic.
> 
> p.s. If you post stuff about this on tumblr, please use the tag fic: jtes because I would love to see it! Thank you for reading :)


	6. Do Monkeys Kiss?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was originally posted [here](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/post/89441026871/jeans-treasure-erens-slave-part-6-7).

“Quit hogging the blanket, you asshole,” grumbled Eren. He had finally taken his wet tunic off and laid it out by Jean’s clothes so it could dry properly, but he was now freezing his ass off.

Jean snatched the moss before it slid off of him. “I need it more than you,” he said, his voice heavy with sleep. “I’m naked.”

“So am I.”

“Well that was your choice, not mine,” said Jean, cracking an eye open. It had stopped raining, but the forest outside the window was still dark. Most of the animals and insects had left once Jean started feeling better, except for Bucky, who had no way of leaving besides jumping from the two story window or swimming through the rooms downstairs. A handful of birds and reptiles remained as well, sleeping in the beams above, and fireflies continued to twinkle around the dark room. Jean’s heart fluttered at the sight of Eren’s familiar scowl and the flower crown still sitting crookedly atop his mop of brown hair.

“Just give me half,” said Eren, pulling.

“Hey! That’s way more than half!”

Bucky rumbled something in his sleep, and Eren and Jean both lowered their voices to harsh whispers.

“Come on, Jean, I’m freezing!”

“Piss off! I’m sick.”

“You’re fine, you big baby.”

“If we’re going to share then at least come closer,” Jean said.

Eren held his arms over his chest, scandalized. “But we’re naked!”

“Who’s acting like a big baby now?” Jean asked, rolling his eyes.

“I’m not a baby. Just… don’t do anything weird, okay?”

“Right back at you,” said Jean, holding the blanket open.

Eren crawled eagerly forward, shivering. He slid down beside Jean, silently thanking the darkness for hiding his embarrassment. He pressed his back into Jean’s chest, and Jean dropped his arm and the blanket of moss around him.

“Finally,” Jean complained, hugging Eren closer. “I thought my balls were going to freeze off.”

“Stop complaining and go to sleep,” said Eren. He was trying not to think about Jean’s lower half pressing against his butt when something cold touched his foot.

Eren gasped. “You’re toes are freezing!”

“Sorry,” said Jean, pulling his feet back.

“Is that normal?” asked Eren.

He felt Jean shrug. “I don’t know. They always get cold at night.”

“Hm.” Eren slid his feet back until they found the chain between Jean’s ankles. He hooked his big toe behind it and pulled, dragging Jean’s feet back to the middle of the bed.

“Eren,” Jean said, sounding annoyed. “What are you doing?”

“Warming you up,” said Eren. He released the chain and rubbed his soles over the top of Jean’s feet, and then started nudging the shackles with his toes.

“ _Eren_ ,” Jean said, audibly grinding his teeth now.

“What?” Eren asked.

Jean lowered his voice to a whisper, “We agreed we wouldn’t do anything weird.” He shifted, running his toes up the arches of Eren’s foot.

Eren squealed, laughing a little too loudly for the silent room. They both froze, holding their breath as Bucky stirred.

“Don’t do that,” Eren said when Bucky started snoring again.

“You started it,” said Jean.

Eren turned so that he was facing Jean. Jean looked away nervously.

“Hey,” Eren whispered.

“What?” Jean asked, eyes on the ceiling.

“You said you liked me, right?” Eren asked.

“…When did I say that?”

“Why are you acting shy all of the sudden?”

Jean sighed, throwing an arm over his eyes. “I don’t know if you are aware of this, Eren, but it’s pretty hard to play it cool with you staring at me like that.”

“Staring at you like what?”

“Like… two inches away from me. With these god damn fireflies reflecting in your eyes. It’s like bad poetry.”

Eren leaned up on his elbow and looked down at Jean, who still had his arm over his face.

“Poetry,” repeated Eren. “I think I’ve heard of that before.”

Jean snorted and lowered his arm to look at Eren. “I’m not going to recite you anything, so don’t ask. And stop moving the blanket, it’s cold.”

Eren lay back down, facing Jean. He made sure their feet were touching, enjoying the way it made Jean squirm.

“Are you warming up yet?” Eren asked.

“Sort of. You?” asked Jean.

“Sort of,” said Eren. They were too cold to care that they were cuddling, and they were too sleepy to think about the fact that the only thing between them was Eren’s key.

The next morning, Bucky was gone and the sunshine was back. Eren emerged from the moss, pushing himself up on his stomach and blinking against the honey light streaming through the window. His wilting flower crown slid off his head and landed on the empty bedding beside him.

“God, it’s like watching a maggot break the soil’s surface for the first time,” Jean commented.

Eren slowly turned, his hair sticking up and clinging onto a few leftover blossoms. Jean laughed at him from his corner, his mouth full of strawberries the squirrels had left them. He was wearing his trousers and vest, but the torn white shirt had been left off. The pile of food under the window was already half-gone, and Eren growled sleepily.

“What was that?” asked Jean, lifting a hand to his ear. “Thank you Jean for being such a wonderful heater last night?”

“Leave me something to eat, you pig,” said Eren.

“I deserve more food than you. I’m recovering,” said Jean.

Eren stood up with the moss wrapped around him and shuffled over, plopping down and opening his mouth.

“What are you, a baby bird?” asked Jean.

Eren grumbled and grabbed a handful of acorns, feeding himself. They ate in contemplative silence for a moment, before Jean spoke up again.

“The flooding is going down,” he said. “I went and checked earlier with Becky.”

“Bucky,” corrected Eren.

“Whatever. It looks like the water is draining down through the floor somehow. But everything’s a mess.”

“Really?” Eren perked up a bit, reaching for the last strawberry.

“Don’t tell me you’re excited about cleaning,” said Jean.

“It’s something to do,” said Eren, popping the strawberry in his mouth. Then he paused mid-chew, remembering his plan to seduce Jean.

“Idiot, you’re not supposed to eat the leaf part,” Jean said, misinterpreting the expression on Eren’s face. But Eren wasn’t focusing on the strawberry. He swallowed and groaned, disappointed in himself. Last night had been the perfect opportunity, but Eren was so caught up in the comfort of it all that he missed it!

“Don’t worry, it won’t kill you,” said Jean. “I think.”

“I’ve eaten strawberries before, so fuck off,” said Eren, standing up and going to pick his tunic up. It was still damp.

“Woah,” said Jean. “Not a morning person?”

“Stop talking for two seconds.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s pissing me off.”

“Why?”

Eren flung the tunic onto the sunny windowsill and clutched the moss tighter around his shoulders. “Because I’m trying to think!” he snapped. He pursed his lips and whistled out the window. Two birds fluttered in, cooing and tweeting.

“Fine,” said Jean angrily. “More food for me.” Eren ignored him, whistling at the birds urgently.

“We have to take action. Now,” Eren told them.

“First things first, dear. You need to calm down,” said the pigeon.

The blue jay nodded. “You’re angry at yourself, and you’re taking it out on the poor boy.”

“Well I can't help it! Now tell me what to do before I mess up again!”

“Okay, relax,” said the blue jay. “You haven’t messed up yet.”

“Be yourself,” said the pigeon.

“Who am I?” Eren said, suddenly going through an identity crisis. Jean chewed moodily, watching Eren whistle.

“You are Eren,” said the blue jay. “The mountain god.”

“That’s it?!” cried Eren. “That’s all I am?”

“You’re cute,” said the pigeon helpfully.

“You’re good at cleaning,” said the blue jay.

“Ugh!” said Eren.

“Is everything alright over there?” asked Jean, finished eating.

Eren turned and whistled angrily in his direction. Jean whistled nonsensically back, reminding Eren that he didn’t speak bird.

“Fine,” said Eren, speaking in human tongue. “If no one’s going to help me, I’ll just do things my way.”

The birds tweeted to stop him, but Eren stomped over to Jean and pulled him to his feet.

“Ouch, hey! What are you-”

“Shh,” said Eren, backing away into the center of the room. “Just watch.”

Jean did as he was told and watched Eren jump up and down a few times, shaking around and then stomping.

“Uh… Eren? What exactly are you doing?” Jean asked, trying not to laugh.

Eren wiggled his butt, trying to imitate Black Widow. “Sending you vibrations.”

“Oh,” said Jean. “Why?”

Eren wiggled and jumped up to Jean, twirling around strands of flowers and dropping his moss blanket. Jean tried to flatten himself against the wall, leaning back on his tiptoes as Eren shimmied up to him.

“So you can have sex with me,” said Eren.

“W-What?” Jean asked, his eyes wide.

“Sex,” Eren repeated. He stopped moving, looking at Jean expectantly. The birds were hiding behind their wings.

Jean grinned at Eren and covered his mouth. His shoulders started shaking, and a snorting sound emitted from between his fingers. Eren, not expecting this reaction, quickly grabbed the moss and covered himself back up.

“Stop it,” said Eren, blushing.

“Sorry,” Jean laughed, bringing the other hand up over his mouth. “But what the hell was that?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing!” echoed Jean, laughing himself to tears. “That was definitely _something_!”

“It was something spiders do,” said Eren, staring down at his toes.

“Then why were you doing it?”

“I told you already,” Eren said quietly, still not looking up.

Jean stopped laughing and asked, “For sex? Eren, you don’t even know what sex is.”

“Yes I do.”

“Okay, even if you do, you don’t want to do it with me. You said you didn’t like me, remember?” Jean didn’t want to bring up the way Eren had turned him down, but the confusion of their current situation was forcing the memory to the surface.

“You don’t have to like somebody to have sex,” mumbled Eren.

“Who told you that?” asked Jean, stepping away from the wall. “Was it that dumb lizard?”

“No,” said Eren, his gaze flickering over to the birds by the window. Jean sighed.

“So why do you want to have sex all the sudden?” Jean asked. “Are you horny?”

“No,” said Eren.

“Is it just a way for you to pass the time?”

“No. I’d rather clean.”

“So what? Is this another one of your stupid punishments?” asked Jean, crossing his arms.

“No,” Eren said, but his voice was laden with guilt. He finally met Jean’s gaze, and it only took a second to click.

“Are you serious?” Jean shouted. “Having sex with me is a punishment?”

“I said no!” shouted Eren, trying to keep up the lie, but it was too late.

“I’ll have you know that intercourse with me is wonderful!” said Jean.

“You’ve done it before?” asked Eren, shocked.

“Well, not entirely,” said Jean.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means there was this girl,” Jean held his hands up, “and we kinda did some,” he pushed one hand toward the other, “but we never,” he clasped his hands together, “you know?” he asked.

“You never held hands?” Eren asked.

“We never actually had sex, you idiot.”

“Never? Ha!” Eren said, clutching the moss to his chest in triumph.

“Well you haven’t either!”

“I haven’t had the chance to,” said Eren. “Until now.”

“I’m not going to have sex with you,” said Jean.

“Why not?”

“Because I don’t want to be your punishment.”

“But you like me,” said Eren.

“Keep being a jerk and I won’t anymore,” said Jean. They glared at each other across the sunlit room.

“Fine,” said Eren. “See how long you can hold yourself back.”

“From what?”

“From me.”

“Is that a challenge?” Jean asked, raising his eyebrows.

“You bet it is,” said Eren, turning on his heel and strutting to the stairwell.

“You sure got cocky overnight,” said Jean.

“I’m a god,” said Eren. “And I’m cute.”

The pigeon threw Eren a thumbs-up sign.

“Where are you going?” asked Jean, trailing after Eren.

“To do what I do best,” said Eren.

“So not dancing, right?”

“No, stupid. I’m going to clean,” said Eren. He descended the stairwell with light feet, feeling a strange confidence now that Jean knew what he was after. Not falling in love was easy, so all that was left was having sex. Over and over and over.

Once Eren and Jean were gone, Dove landed gracefully onto the drying tunic beside the pigeon and the blue jay.

“Eren sure swung into a good mood quickly,” said the blue jay.

“That’s because he confirmed that Jean still likes him,” said Dove.

“Good things are coming,” said the pigeon. “I can feel it.”

The following week was an interesting one. Once the water had drained away, Eren put Jean to work scrubbing the floors and rolling away debris. Jean found a golden comb and carefully smoothed out his bed, clearing it of any twigs and pebbles.

They continued to use the upstairs for sleeping, after Eren insisted that the main room was too messy to sleep in. Jean didn’t argue, since Eren was clearly happier after a good night’s sleep anyway, and Jean might have secretly liked waking up to Eren’s earthy smell beside him. Maybe.

Jean complained about cleaning, of course, but found he did not mind so much when Eren was bent over something in front of him. Or when Eren’s tunic got wet after he’d been cleaning out the fountain on the fourth day.

“Woops,” Eren had said. “You can see right through it!”

“Good try,” said Jean, but he didn’t look away.

The day after that, Eren started to hum. Jean had to slap himself more than once after staring too long and too lovingly at Eren’s concentrated scowl. What Jean didn’t know was that the birds were giving Eren singing lessons in hopes of seducing Jean; what the birds didn't know was that Eren’s mating call was working on Jean prematurely.

After the debris was cleared and the tiles were gleaming, Eren started organizing the treasure. Jean hovered around the coins and chalices protectively, but Eren shooed him away, claiming he was looking for something.

“What on earth could he be looking for?” Jean asked the squirrels that were watching him clean the mirror. They chirped a reply and spiked up their fur in an effort to look more like Jean.

On the sixth day of cleaning, Jean heard something like a trumpet come from somewhere inside the temple. He looked around and saw that he was completely alone in the front hall; not even the squirrels were around to bother him.

The trumpet blasted again. “What the heck is that?” Jean wondered, getting up and walking into the next passageway. He turned the corner into the main room, and found it eerily empty.

The trumpet blasted, causing him to jump and twist toward the fountain room. Jean walked through the archway and shielded his eyes against the setting sun coming in between the pillars on the opposite wall.

“Jean,” Eren’s voice sang out, and the trumpet sounds blasted in his ears. Jean hollered and covered the sides of his head, looking up to the middle of the fountain.

Eren stood on the top of the fountain’s flow in his tunic, clad in pounds of golden necklaces, braided belts, and emerald bracelets. He wore the flower crown Jean had made him, the blossoms somehow even more vibrant and alive than they originally had been. Turquoise beads hung off the crown now, complimenting Eren’s brilliant eyes beautifully.

The trumpet blasted again and again, and Jean saw that it was not quite a trumpet, but a large white horn being played like an instrument by the buck. The buck blinked its deep black eyes at Jean and snorted.

“Do you like my colors?” asked Eren, popping his hip to the side to flaunt a large fan of exotic feathers. Birds squawked and flapped their approval from the beams above. Every insect in the temple was clinging to the walls and pillars of the room, shimmering their wings the best they could in the pink light. The purple lizard was directing snakes in patterns through the water, reflecting the shimmering light up onto Eren’s impressive figure.

Bucky blew the horn again and Eren wobbled, laughing. The squirrels appeared behind Jean, pushing his feet forward.

“Wait, wait,” Jean said, but he scuffled forward. The squirrels squeaked and continued to push him until he nearly fell into the fountain.

Eren did a little shake of his hips. “Is this enough, or do you want me to sing for you, too?”

Jean laughed. He couldn’t help it; the mood was infectious. Eren was having fun for once, and Jean’s heart was doing little back flips in his chest.

“Please don’t sing,” said Jean.

“But I’m seducing you,” said Eren. “It’s only proper that I sing.”

“You should stop taking advice from animals,” Jean said.

“But its good advice,” said Eren.

“No it’s not.”

“Are you sure? You can't take your eyes off me,” said Eren.

“That’s because I’m afraid you’ll fall.”

“Have you been afraid of that all week?” Eren asked smugly.

Jean opened his mouth but remained silent, realizing he must have been staring more obviously than he thought.

Bucky blew the horn again, and Eren really did lose his balance this time. He swore and landed in the water, splashing the colors of the sunset up into Jean’s face. The snakes swam wildly away, and the lizard shrieked, now dripping wet.

“Damn it!” Eren shouted, splashing the water angrily. “I almost had you that time!”

“No you didn’t,” Jean laughed, squatting down and resting his elbows on the fountain’s edge.

“Just give up and have sex with me already,” said Eren.

“Wow, when you make it sound all romantic like that, then sure,” Jean said.

“Really?”

“Hell no.”

“Why the hell not?” Eren asked, mimicking Jean’s language.

“Because I want you to like me,” said Jean.

Eren groaned, throwing his head back. “That goes against the whole point,” he said.

“What does? What point?”

“I can’t like you,” said Eren.

“Why not?”

“Because that’s a human emotion.”

“Oh,” said Jean, understanding. “So _that’s_ the punishment?”

“Yeah.”

“Not just the having sex part?”

“Right. It’s having sex without falling in love. Shit, that sounds stupid when I say it to you.”

“Why are you telling me this?” asked Jean. “It’s just going to make me mad.”

“Because apparently I tell you everything,” said Eren, taking his flower crown off and letting it float away in the water. “I don’t know why, and it’s annoying as fuck. Can we have sex now?”

“No.”

“Ugh.”

“So you can’t like me because it’s a feeling reserved for humans?”

“Yes.”

“That’s stupid,” said Jean.

“You're stupid,” said Eren.

“Do you know what else is human?” asked Jean.

“What?”

 _You_ , Jean thought, but he was too embarrassed to say it out loud. Instead, he leaned across the fountain’s edge and kissed Eren on the lips.

“That,” said Jean, pulling back.

“Animals do that too,” said Eren, scowling and blushing simultaneously.

“No they don’t,” said Jean. “Not really.”

“Hm,” said Eren, thinking. “If it's exclusively human, then I can’t do it.”

“I’ve heard monkeys do it,” Jean said quickly, wanting to kiss Eren again. “Monkeys are animals.”

“Then why the fuck not?” Eren said, allowing himself to believe it. He splashed forward, impatiently pressing his lips to Jean’s.

“But no sex,” Jean murmured, returning the kiss eagerly.

Eren climbed up onto the edge of the fountain, not separating from Jean, and Jean followed the movement, pulling Eren out of the water and on top of him. Eren leaned forward, and Jean leaned back until he was flat against the clean tiles. He wrapped his arms around Eren’s torso when he felt Eren tangle his fingers in his hair, both breathing heavily through their noses.

“Ha,” Eren panted, breaking away. “Hold on.”

“ _Why?_ ” Jean groaned, opening his eyes. But then he knew why, seeing a hundred little faces gawking at him from the walls and ceiling.

“Come on,” Eren said, pecking Jean on the lips and pulling him to his feet.

Jean was kissed and groped all the way out of the room, aware of how bright everything was. Making out and touching in broad daylight, where they could see each other and read each other’s reactions so clearly was terrifying. He decided not to worry about it when Eren pushed him onto his mossy bed surrounded by the mounds of treasure Eren had organized. Eren’s bracelets and necklaces clinked as he followed Jean onto the ground, and Jean had to hold his hands up to slow him down.

“At least let me catch my breath,” Jean panted. “Moron.”

“Don’t want to,” said Eren, going in for another kiss.

“Mmf! Christ, wait!” Jean said, hating how out of breath he was. He felt like he was going to pass out. “If you don’t want to stop, then kiss me where it isn’t going to suffocate me!”

Eren immediately went for Jean’s neck, mouthing the spot behind his ear. Jean swore, hooking his feet chained behind Eren’s back and squeezing.

Eren laughed against his skin in triumph. “You squeal whenever I scrape my teeth against you,” he said, doing just that on his Adam’s apple.

Jean punched between Eren’s shoulder blades as another squeak passed his lips. “I hate you,” he said, something like a laughing following his words.

“No you don’t,” said Eren.

“Bite me. Ow! Don’t actually bite me!”

Eren sat back, his heavy necklaces lifting from Jean’s chest. He pushed Jean’s knees as far apart as the chain would allow and pointed at his crotch. “You’re uncomfortable here, right?” he asked.

“You don't have to point at it!”

“Take your vest off,” said Eren.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” said Jean, taking his vest off anyway. Once it was fully removed, Eren leaned down and planted a kiss on Jean’s hipbone, causing him to yelp. “What are you doing?!” Jean huffed.

“Kissing,” said Eren, pulling Jean’s trousers down.

“Not there!” shrieked Jean.

Eren paused, his mouth hovering over Jean’s dick. “Why not?”

Jean just stared at him, unable to come up with a reason for him to stop. Eren grinned and tilted his head, not taking his eyes off Jean’s face.

“How about here?” he asked, pressing his ruby lips to the base of Jean’s cock.

“Nng!” Jean clutched at the moss with his fingers. Eren snickered, watching Jean’s chest heave beneath him.

“You suck,” said Jean, falling back on the moss again.

“No I don’t. But I can try,” said Eren, licking his lips.

“I hate you so much right now.”

“No you don’t.”

Jean wiggled his toes. “Okay fine, I don’t. But we all knew that already. Now are you going to do something or just sit there?”

“Um,” Eren said, stopping suddenly.

“What?”

“Don’t freak out.”

Jean looked down at where Eren sat between his legs, his clothes and jewelry still wet from the fountain. “Don’t freak out about what?” Jean asked apprehensively.

“I think I’m shifting,” said Eren.

“…You mean like, you’re getting bigger?” asked Jean, lifting his head to see Eren’s bulge better. “Because that’s called a boner, dude.”

“No,” said Eren, rubbing his hands in his tunic uneasily. “No. It’s more like... I’m thinking weird things.”

“Like what?”

“Like I want to eat you.”

“ _What?_ ” Jean asked, sitting up.

“Or squish you,” said Eren.

“Are you feeling okay?” Jean asked, placing a hand on Eren’s forehead. “Did I get you sick after all?”

“I’m fine,” said Eren, swatting the hand away.

“You should lay down,” said Jean. He stood up and pulled his trousers back up regretfully.

“No!” Eren said, determined. “I’m fine. Let’s keep going.”

“You just said you wanted to kill me,” said Jean.

“But I don’t want you to die,” Eren frowned.

“Well I hate to break it to you, but eating me or squishing me would definitely kill me.”

“I didn’t mean it like that!”

“Then what the hell did you mean?”

“I don’t know!” Eren shouted desperately. “I was just telling you how you make me feel!”

“And I make you hungry?” Jean asked.

“You make me happy,” Eren said. “Like really fucking happy.”

Jean looked surprised. “I do?”

“Yeah, you do. Mostly.”

“Does that mean,” Jean paused, shooting Eren a smile, “that you like me?”

Eren laughed, but Jean smiled bigger. Eren stopped laughing and said, “No way.”

“You like me?” asked Jean.

“No.”

“Love me?”

“No!”

“Eren,” Jean said, sitting back down on the moss and taking Eren’s hand.

“Stop.”

“Stop what?” Jean asked, kissing the back of Eren’s hand.

“Smiling,” Eren said, not attempting to pull his hand away.

“Why should I?” Jean rose to his knees and continued his kisses up Eren’s arm.

“Because it makes me want to punch you in the face,” Eren said through his teeth.

Jean kissed up to Eren’s shoulder and then paused. “Want to make out some more instead?” he asked, pulling back to look Eren in the face.

Eren rolled his eyes and wrapped his arms around Jean’s neck. “Only because I’m bored. Not because I like you or something lame like that.”

That night, Eren decided it was clean enough to sleep downstairs again. The sky was clear after days of rain, and Jean could see the cosmos more clearly than he had ever seen them before.

 

“Jean,” Eren hissed from his pedestal. “Are you asleep?”

“…Yes.”

“Oh. Nevermind, then.”

Jean sighed and slowly sat up so he could see Eren over his treasure barricades. “I’m obviously not asleep, idiot. What is it?”

Eren was curled up on his side, facing Jean. His green eyes shimmered blue in the pale light coming through the ceiling.

“Are you tired?” Eren asked.

“Yes.”

“I’m not.”

“Cool,” Jean said, lying back down. An entire day of cleaning and making out was exhausting.

“Okay,” came Eren’s voice. “Nevermind.”

Jean grumbled and sat back up. “What is it?” he asked again.

“No, nothing. Sorry.”

Jean rubbed his face. “Eren, just get over here.”

“What? Ew, no.”

“You can’t sleep, right?”

Eren scowled at being found out. “How will going over there help?”

“Well my bed’s not a fucking stone pedestal for one thing,” said Jean. “Or do you find enjoyment sleeping in places built for statues?”

“You know it’s not for enjoyment,” said Eren.

“I know,” Jean groaned out. “I can’t believe you’re still on about those stupid punishments. We’ve been sleeping in the same bed for over a week now, so get over here already.”

“If I can’t sleep here then I definitely won’t be able to sleep next to your smelly ass.”

“Fine, whatever,” Jean yawned. He lay down for what he hoped would be the last time that night.

“Jean,” Eren’s voice hissed in his ear.

“AH!” Jean bolted upright and found an alert pair of eyes inches from his own. “What the hell, Eren?”

“I changed my mind, scoot over.”

“How do you move so freaking fast? And what happened to not sleeping by my smelly ass?”

Eren settled down beside Jean, the warmth of his body waking Jean’s own nerves up significantly

“I decided that your smelly ass was way more of a punishment than that scentless stone,” said Eren, wiggling into the moss and closing his eyes. “Besides, I’m still in the process of seducing you. Goodnight.”

“Good… night…?” Jean stared down at the boy beside him, and within seconds, Eren’s breathing evened out and Jean was the one left wide-awake.

Jean lowered back to the floor and stared up at the ceiling, where the stars were blinking through the tangles of vines and wood. Eren’s rhythmic exhales puffed against Jean’s shoulder, and Jean remembered the last time they had slept in this exact spot.

Unfortunately, that also brought back memories of Eren’s face, and Eren’s voice, panting Jean, Jean, _Jean_ -

Jean turned over so his back was facing Eren, and he found himself staring at the mirror against the wall. His reflection stared back, its expression hopeless as he resigned himself to another sleepless and hormone-filled night.

But he must have drifted off without realizing it. He woke in the morning with his eyes still closed. He snuggled his face into the soft warmth wrapped up in his arms, and he thought, _ah, this must be Eren_ , and didn’t even care how lame cuddling with such a loser was because let’s face it, they had done it before.

But then Jean noticed Eren felt a bit warmer than usual. And rounder. Jean opened his eyes and frowned at all the brown fuzz in front of him.

“Jean,” said Bob.

“Fuck!” Jean hurled himself away. He slammed against a pile of treasure, and chalices and ceremony bells clattered and rang as they bounced off Jean’s head.

“Sorry to startle you,” said Bob.

Jean glared at him. “What were you doing?”

“I came to see you,” said Bob. “I was told you needed something of me?”

Jean remembered sending the two pigs to fetch him. “Ah,” said Jean, rubbing the back of his head. “Right. I had a question to ask you.”

“Abut what?”

“About Eren’s punishments.”

“Ah,” said Bob. “I knew you would want to know eventually. He never did anything to deserve them, of that’s where this is going. He grew up being told he was a monster, so a monster he believes he is. But I’ve heard these punishments of his have taken an interesting turn, eh?”

Jean’s stomach did a stupid little flip. “How does everyone know about our sex life?” he asked.

“Or lack thereof,” said Bob. “Way to cherish your virginity, champ.”

“Shut up,” Jean groaned. “How did you even hear about this?”

“A little birdie told me,” said Bob, chuckling. “Apparently that’s a thing humans say. But a bird actually told me.”

“Figures,” said Jean. “But let’s get back to things that actually matter.”

“You don’t feel that your sex life matters? That’s not a good foundation for a relationship,” said Bob.

“It’s your opinion that doesn’t matter,” said Jean. “Anyway, I have another question.”

“What?”

Jean lowered his voice. “Has Eren ever actually tried getting out of here?”

Bob lowered his head. “You want the truth?”

“Obviously I want the truth!”

“Don’t get mad.”

“I can’t promise anything,” said Jean.

Bob sighed. “In all my time knowing Eren, I have never actually seen him try to break the spell wrapped around the temple.”

“I knew it. What a fucking asshole,” Jean growled, curling his hand into a fist.

“You are mad,” said Bob. “Is it because you know he can do it?”

“Well he still has powers,” said Jean, looking down at his wrists. “I think.”

Bob snorted. “Of course he does. Eren is a god. What is a human spell against the power of a god?”

Jean was becoming furious. “So that’s it? He’s been faking being powerless this whole time?”

“No, no,” said Bob sadly. “Eren believes he is powerless. He wanted that trading spell to work from the beginning. But he’s already done many things he shouldn’t be able to under the influence of the spell. Learning the languages, for example.”

“You mean I can't learn how to speak squirrel?” asked Jean, disappointed.

“Of course not,” said Bob. “Are you an idiot?”

“No.”

“Yes, you are,” said Bob. “You both are.”

“Thanks,” said Jean.

“There are other things he does that goes against the spell as well. He doesn’t even realize he can overcome it. He does it sub-consciously.”

“The bracelets,” said Jean, thinking about the first time he met Eren. “They should have broken when he shifted. But he was still wearing them even after that,” Jean remembered Eren greeting the procession right after that, stark naked except for his jewelry. “Is that something he magically did?”

“I wasn’t there, but it sounds like something he’d do,” said Bob. “Those bracelets are very symbolic to him, so it would make sense for him to keep them from breaking apart.”

“I hate his freaking symbols,” Jean said.

“If the bracelets broke during the transformation, then surely this temple should have been in much worse shape than it is. Yet the ceiling still barely holds together,” said Bob, looking up.

“And he moves super fast sometimes!” added Jean.

“And he summoned that dreadful storm last week,” said Bob. “It’s the reason I took so long getting here.”

“And his hair always looks so good! I mean short.”

Bob chuckled again, eying Jean in a way that embarrassed him. “You don’t seem nearly as upset as I thought you would be,” he said.

“Oh, I am upset,” said Jean. “I’m livid.”

“Sure you are,” said Bob.

“I am!”

“You might be, but you seem more concerned than angry,” observed Bob.

“I’m concerned because last time I accused him of purposefully trapping himself here, he flooded my bed! It took us a week to clean everything up,” said Jean.

“Just ease him into the idea,” said Bob. “Maybe you can trick him into going outside. You’re clever.”

“You just called me an idiot,” said Jean.

“You are only an idiot when it comes to Eren,” said Bob.

“What the hell?” Eren’s voice cut through the air, cold and sharp. Jean and Bob jumped, whirling around to see Eren standing in the archway to the water fountain room. His tunic was wrapped like a towel around his waste, and the flower crown Jean had made was sitting on top of his wet hair. Jean spotted a matching flower crown in one of his hands.

“Eren,” said Bob, visibly tense. “How long have you been standing there?”

“Long enough,” said Eren.

“Great,” said Jean, standing up. “So you know everything. Let’s get out of here.”

“I can’t,” said Eren.

“But you can,” said Jean.

“No!”

“Eren,” said Bob, stepping forward.

“Stay out of this!” shouted Eren, raising the hand that wasn’t holding the flowers. Bob rose into the air and flew backwards, hitting a crumbling pillar with a thud. The two piglets ran in from where they had apparently been eavesdropping, and they helped nudge Bob to his feet.

Eren’s eyes widened, and he looked from the pigs to the palm of his hand.

Jean took a step back. “Eren,” he said carefully.

“Get out.”

“Eren-’

“Get out!” screamed Eren. The ground rippled, and Jean stumbled backward. The metal on his wrists and ankles cracked apart, and the shackles and chain clattered to the ground.

Jean rubbed his wrists, the skin feeling foreign. He looked up and saw Eren, his jade eyes watering.

“I guess I can do it,” said Eren, his voice wavering.

“This is a good thing,” said Jean. “We can leave.”

Eren threw the new flower crown at Jean angrily, but Jean caught it. “Just take your stupid treasure and go by yourself!” said Eren. “That’s why you came here in the first place.”

“Fine,” said Jean, throwing aside the crown. He stomped over to Eren and grabbed his hand, dragging him toward the passageway.

Eren tried to pull back, exasperated. “I can't leave, you jerk!”

“I’m just doing what you told me to do.”

“I told you to take the treasure!”

They turned a corner and were in the front hall with the morning light beckoning them outside.

“I am taking my treasure,” said Jean.

Eren’s cheeks turned bright red, and he fought against the pull harder. “That was so milky!” Eren said, struggling to free his hands in embarrassment.

“Cheesy,” Jean corrected him, still pulling Eren toward the main archway.

“I can't go, Jean! What happens after we leave?” Eren asked, and Jean could feel his hands starting to sweat. “What happens when I become this big monster and stomp all over country? What if I ruin the Rain Forest?”

“Ocean,” Jean said.

“Well what if I get angry and destroy the _ocean_?”

Jean stopped moving, but he didn't let go of Eren’s hand. “Eren. It’s an endless expanse of liquid. How exactly are you planning on destroying it?”

“I don’t know, but it could happen.”

“Even if it could happen- which it can’t- I’ll be with you, so it won’t happen.”

“No offense, Jean, but you’re no match for me in my titan form.”

“First of all, that was pretty offensive, even if it was true. Second of all, _titan_?”

Eren shrugged, still staring at their hands. “You got a better name for it?”

“I don’t know, maybe Earthquake Eren? Or Holy-Shit-I-Just-Shit-My-Pants Eren?”

Eren looked up and grinned. “Did you shit your pants that day?”

“No! And we’re getting off topic.” Jean brought their hands to his chest and laced his fingers between Eren’s. “Come with me.”

Eren’s finger’s twitched. “What happens when you die of old age?” he asked.

“You could probably age with me if you wanted to,” said Jean.

“I don’t want t age!” cried Eren.

“If I die before you, then I’ll haunt you,” said Jean.

“I don’t want you to be a ghost,” said Eren, shivering. “Lizard tells horrible stories about ghosts.”

“I won’t be a scary one, promise. And maybe when I’m a ghost I’ll be able to talk to lizards and stuff.”

“…I’d rather you just leave.”

Jean let go of Eren’s hands. “Fine,” he said, taking a large step backward toward the exit.

“What?”

“I said fine. I’ll go without you,” Jean said.

Eren let his hands fall to his sides. “Really?”

“Really,” Jean said firmly.

“Oh,” Eren said, the relief in his voice obvious. “Good.”

It was Jean’s turn to look confused. “Huh?” he asked, halting mid-step.

“I said alright.”

“No, you were supposed to say you want to come with me,” Jean said.

“Why would I say that?”

“Because I used reverse psychology.”

“I don’t know what that is, but you must be using it wrong, because I’m not going with you.”

“You have to! You _love_ me!”

“I never said that,” Eren argued. “You’re the one assuming things. You have no idea how I feel. You never did.”

“It’s obvious!” Jean was shouting, as if the volume of his words would overthrow his sudden uncertainty. “Have you seen yourself? You’re so easy to read. Your thoughts are always written so clearly on your face, so don’t lie to me and tell me you don’t at least _like_ me.”

Eren’s eyes went cold, piercing Jean’s pounding heart like a shard of ice.

“If I’m so easy to read,” he said, his voice twisting the ice in Jean’s chest, “then tell me if I’m lying when I say this: In all my centuries on this earth, I have been abandoned, chased, beaten, tricked, imprisoned, and ridiculed by humans. I would never let myself like one, much less fall in love with one.”

“You suck,” Jean said.

“At least I don’t suck nipples,” Eren replied blankly.

Jean gasped, horrified at how good Eren was becoming at comebacks. But Jean had a better one.

“Well you suck dick.”

“I _almost_ sucked your dick.”

“Ugh!” Jean started off in a rage. “I’m leaving!”

“Good,” said Eren.

“I mean, it’s not like I really wanted you to come,” said Jean, turning back again. “It’s not like I need you.”

“Then leave already.”

“I am!”

“You’re walking the wrong way,” said Eren.

“I’m taking a detour,” Jean said, coming up to Eren and slapping him hard across the face. Eren stepped back, stunned.

“What was that for?”

“For breaking my heart,” said Jean. “Did you bite your tongue?”

Eren shook his head from side to side, a bit dazedly.

“Good,” said Jean. “I’m leaving for real this time, and I’m not coming back. Try not to cut yourself on anything until the next offering, not that the spells work anyway.”

Eren rubbed his cheek and watched Jean stomp out of the temple.

“Don’t worry,” Jean said to the group of squirrels that followed him out worriedly. “I’ll be back.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [cloudglo](http://cloudglo.tumblr.com/), [sillypeppers](http://sillypeppers.tumblr.com/), and [viella-art](http://viella-art.tumblr.com/) all created gorgeous fanart of this fic!!! You can see the masterpieces in the [JTES tag](http://circus-runaway.tumblr.com/tagged/FIC%3A-JTES) on my tumblr :D
> 
> Thank you for reading!


	7. It's my birthday and I can cry if I want to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Thank you for your patience!!! You are all so amazing and I can’t believe how many of you have stuck with this story and I am so happy to be able to finally give you the end!
> 
> Also, please check out the beautiful [JTES art tag](http://qwartney.tumblr.com/tagged/jtes-art) on my tumblr!

Falling asleep was no problem, but Eren’s dreams kept him from sleeping peacefully. He sat up on the pedestal exhausted, thinking back on the images and still feeling the loneliness of wandering the empty temple. The dream had been far into the future where no other living creatures remained. He was left to watch the sun rise and fall day after day for what felt like forever.

It was obvious what his brain was trying to tell him. Eren wasn’t stupid, but the dream had felt so endless and empty that he woke up crying. He then remembered something and his crying slowed to a stop: Lizard had been in his dream briefly. She had burped and fire came out. Was that symbolic somehow?

Something interrupted Eren’s muddled thoughts. Was that… music he was hearing?

The sound echoed around the temple, and Eren slipped off his pedestal sleepily. Where was it coming from? It wasn’t the usual drums the villagers used. Instead, a light melody somehow matched the dusty sunlight that filtered through the walls. Eren realized he must still be asleep.

 _Oh well_ , he thought. _This dream is much better than the last one_.

He followed the song he had never heard before, and found he liked it a lot. The loudest part was coming from the western side of the temple, so he went up to his room and looked out the window.

“What are you doing here?” Eren asked.

“I’m here to court you,” Jean answered. Around him, the birds whistled the main melody while the pigs honked out a baritone background. Rattlesnakes and dragonflies shook to create a rhythm. Other animals did whatever they could to keep the melody going, except the beetles, who were doing a miniature rendition of the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet near Jean’s feet. Jean shooed the beetles to the side, annoyed.

“What’s court?” asked Eren.

“It means I want to date you.”

“What’s date?”

“It means I want to take you places. And hold your hand.”

“That’s stupid,” Eren said, hiding his embarrassment with a yawn. “And I thought you weren’t coming back.”

“I lied, obviously,” said Jean, shooing the beetles away again as they tried to pick up where they left off. “Now will you stop asking questions and just listen?”

“Listen to what?” Eren asked.

Jean cleared his throat and opened his mouth.

“Roses are red,” sang Jean.

“Oh god,” said Eren.

“And violets might be blue,” Jean continued. This wasn’t a dream. Jean was below the window, actually _singing_.

“Please stop,” Eren said, mortified.

“But one thing’s for sure: Our love will always be true,” Jean said, smiling proudly at his own rhyming words.

Eren rubbed his face, trying to will this back into a dream.

“I know it feels weird, but please don’t deny your love for me,” sang Jean.

“What love?” Eren asked, bringing his hands down.

“It’s just a guess, but your love runs as deep as the sea.”

“Is the sea that deep?” Eren mumbled to himself.

“What was that?”

“I said you suck at pottery,” Eren shouted down.

“Poetry,” corrected Jean, before singing again, “Like the stars in your irises, may these feelings between us forever shine.”

Eren waved his hand uncaringly. “Like the buzzing of a bee, your words mean nothing to me,” he sang, matching Jean’s previous tune. The birds twittered excitedly, their music falling off beat. When no more verses floated Eren’s way, the mountain god frowned in disappointment. “What? Are we done already?”

Jean straightened up. “O-Of course not! But what the hell was that?” asked Jean.

“What was what?”

“That thing you just did! With the _bee_ and the _me_!”

“It’s called rhyming.”

“I know what it’s called,” said Jean, irritated. He had stayed up all night, putting lines together and practicing them in front of animals, and although most of the critters looked on with vague expressions, the squirrels had nodded their approval throughout the night. One even went so far as to swoon! And here Eren was, puffing out poetry like it was his native tongue.

“Oh, are you embarrassed?” Eren said, smiling as he noticed the way Jean was slowly turning red. “Does my pottery turn you on?”

“ _It’s poetry!_ ” Jean corrected again, his hands balling into fists by his sides. “And no it does not!”

“Have my words made you hot?”

“I said no! Now stop rhyming!”

“But we have perfect timing.”

“Why the hell are you so good at this?”

“Because I’ve had a lot of time to practice.”

Jean let out a frustrated growl and stalked over to the tree with branches that stretched out toward Eren’s window.

“Where are you going?” Eren asked cheerily, assuming he had scared Jean off.

“I’m coming up there to beat the crap out of you,” said Jean.

“As wonderful as that sounds, I’ve got a lot to do,” Eren rhymed, drifting away from the windowsill.

“We both know that’s a lie,” Jean called after him. But Eren was either gone, or he wasn’t listening. Jean grunted as he pulled himself onto the branch nearest to the temple, dismayed to find he was still perched impossibly far away from the window.

“Come on, Jean,” he told himself, gritting his teeth. “You’re a professional thief. A few months of lazing around in a temple hasn’t made you any less of an athlete.” It sounded even less convincing out loud.

Shaking off his worry at the two-story drop between him and his destination, Jean sprang off the branch like a frog. As feared, however, the windowsill was just out of reach, and his body hit the side of the temple with a thud.

“Oof!” He winced, but managed to cling on to a protruding edge just below the windowsill.

“Idiot!”

Jean looked up to see Eren leaning out of the temple and glaring down at him, his bracelets clinking as his strong hands grasped Jean’s forearms.

“Woops,” Jean laughed, eyes glued to the key that dangled from Eren’s neck. As it glinted in the sunlight, Jean was reminded that this was the key that was supposedly keeping Eren from turning into a monster. It was the same kind of so-called “magic” in the seals creating the barrier.

As Eren leaned _even further out of the barrier_ , Jean had to bite his tongue to keep from saying anything. If he pointed it out now, Eren would probably get pissed and drop him. Plus, this only confirmed Jean’s theory, and now he was positive his plan to get Eren out of the temple would work. As long as he could keep Eren distracted.

Eren hauled Jean up into the room and they both staggered before regaining their balance.

“Thanks,” Jean said a little breathlessly, resting his head on Eren’s chest. The key pressed into his forehead.

“You’re bleeding,” Eren pushed Jean away and grabbed his hands so he could see them better. Sure enough, Jean now had scrapes along the pads of his fingers. They weren’t deep at all, but before Jean could examine them further, Eren was leading him down the stairs, probably intending to clean his wounds by the fountain.

“Wait, Eren, wait,” Jean said, pulling back at the base of the stairs.

“No. What if it gets infected?” Eren asked, reaching out for Jean again.

Jean’s mind went blank with unexpected anger. “What do you care if it gets infected or not? I’m a _human_ remember?”

“That’s exactly why we have to clean it.”

“I’m not that fragile,” Jean said, retreating up a step in order to dodge Eren’s hands.

“Yes you are,” said Eren, pursuing him.

“Stop trying to help me.”

“Why?”

“Because you hate me!”

“I never said that.”

Jean smacked Eren’s hands away. “You said you could never love a human.”

“But Jean-”

“I am human, Eren!” Jean’s voice cracked, and he ran up the stairs, cursing himself for letting the conversation turn like this. He was supposed to be getting Eren out of the temple, not having some stupid lover’s quarrel with him! Not that they were lovers. Or would ever be. His heart gave an awful jerk at the thought.

But so what if Eren didn’t love him?

Jean stopped climbing, clutching at his chest. He had never really thought about it before, and despite teasing Eren with confessions day after day, he had never taken his own confessions seriously. But at this moment, for some reason, it struck Jean like a thousand pounds of bird shit that he really was in love with Eren.

He loved him.

Jean’s eyes pricked. “What a fucking idiot,” he mumbled, not sure if he meant Eren or himself. He rubbed his eyes and turned just as Eren came rushing around the curved stairs. Eren startled to a stop below Jean, his bright eyes capturing the angled light coming from the room above. The flower crown was wilting worse than ever, its graying leaves clinging to his brown hair.

Jean took a breath. Even if Eren didn’t love him back – _the_ _jerk_ – Jean still wanted to see him happy. And he knew Eren could never be truly happy as long as he was trapped in this temple.

As he let the breath go, he whispered out the remainder of his poem, finding his throat too tight to say the words at full volume: “And because I l-love you,” he swallowed, “I cannot leave without your hand in mine.”

Eren huffed angrily. “I told you Jean, I am not leaving.”

Jean scoffed and shoved past Eren, who followed him out into the main room. Jean turned nodded to the animals who were sneaking in through the doorways and peaking out from behind pillars. Taking it as their cue, the melody from before started up again, and Jean held out a hand, palm facing up.

“Do you know how to dance?”

Eren balked. “ _What?_ ”

“It’s fine, I’ll lead.”

“What? No, no, no, a hundred times no.”

“Why not?” Jean asked, keeping his hand out invitingly.

“Why should I?”

“Because it’s fun. One dance, and then I’ll leave you forever. I’ll never come back.”

Eren stared at the hand suspiciously. “That’s what you said yesterday.”

“I mean it this time.”

“Really?” Eren asked tentatively, placing his hand on top of Jean’s.

Jean grabbed it tight and pulled Eren to him. “Nope.”

“That’s cheating!” Eren exclaimed. He stumbled as Jean began to step around the room, following the melody the animals were putting on for them.

“Of course I cheated,” said Jean, guiding them around a pile of platters. “I am a criminal, you know.”

“Ugh,” said Eren, feigning disgust. He gave Jean a sly smile when his feet finally found the rhythm. “Just one dance, then leave me alone.”

“Yeah, yeah,” said Jean.

“I mean it.”

When Jean only shrugged, Eren pulled them into a sharp turn.

“Woah! Hey,” Jean complained, feeling his center of gravity tipped to the side as Eren dipped him low to the ground.

“I never said I didn’t know how to dance,” said Eren, laughing at the expression on Jean’s face.

“Okay, I think we need to find you other things to do with your free time. Besides poetry and dancing.”

“I clean, too,” said Eren, pulling Jean up.

“At least you don’t know how to cook, or I’d be swooning,” Jean said sarcastically.

“I don’t need to know how to cook.”

“And you need to know how to dance?”

“I _like_ dancing.”

“Who taught you?”

“No one.”

“Was it Bob?”

“…”

Jean laughed at the mental image of Bob and Eren dancing around. Eren stumbled again, giving Jean the opportunity to take back the lead and stepped them through a doorway. They moved down the dimly lit passage and the animals followed, crawling on the walls or fluttering ahead. Eren’s grip on Jean’s shoulder tightened, and with their next step, he pressed his chest into Jean’s.

“You dance like a monkey,” said Eren, after Jean tried whirling him around.

“That’s because this is called the monkey tango,” Jean lied. In all honesty, he had a very limited idea of what he was doing. He had never taken real dance lessons from someone who actually knew how to dance.

“Oh.” Of course Eren believed him. “Who taught you?”

“My mom?” Damn it, even his lies sounded lame.

“You have a mom?”

“Uh,” Jean almost laughed. “Everyone has a mom at some point, Eren.”

“I know. I meant you still have a mom? Like, she’s alive?”

“Oh. Um, yeah.”

“Are we almost done?” Eren asked.

Jean let him changed the subject. They could talk about their families when Eren was ready, or never. Whatever Eren wanted. “Not yet, why? Not enjoying yourself?”

Eren puffed out his cheeks and refused to respond. When they came into the light of the front hall, Jean was surprised to see Eren sporting a heavy blush.

“No need to get all shy,” said Jean, sounding cocky despite his own sudden embarrassment.

“You’re the one blushing,” Eren whispered in his ear, sounding equally pretend-cocky. Now they were both red. Jean tried to breathe evenly, but the warmth spreading within his ribcage was suffocating him from the inside out. He held Eren’s hand tighter, and Eren responded with a puff of laughter against Jean’s neck.

The animals were clearly enjoying themselves as well. The pigs accidentally tripped Jean up a few times as they scuttled around each other, imitating the humans. The birds never stopped singing, and the steady beat of stones clacking against each other in the squirrel’s hands kept Eren and Jean’s feet moving. Lizard watched nervously from the side of a pillar, glancing between the dancing pair and the exit.

Jean glanced at the exit too, drawing nearer and nearer to it as they danced.

“So,” said Jean, suddenly realizing he needed another distraction if he was going to successfully dance Eren outside.

Eren snorted unattractively. “So?” he said, mocking.

“ _So_ ,” Jean repeated, dancing nonchalantly into a conversation. “I think my hands stopped bleeding.”

Eren, realizing he was holding onto one of Jean’s bloody hands, grimaced. “Oh. Congratulations.”

“Humans aren’t so fragile after all, huh?” Jean teased.

“It could still be infected.”

“Relax, I’m not going to die,” said Jean. _Just a little farther_.

Eren’s steps faltered, slowing them down significantly.

“I thought you knew how to dance,” Jean laughed nervously. They were only a few paces away from the exit now.

“You’re wrong,” Eren said seriously.

Jean looked distractedly at the exit. “Hm?”

Eren stopped moving altogether. Jean tried to pull them, but Eren wouldn’t budge. He didn’t even stagger.

“Eren?” Jean asked, and then he hissed in pain as Eren’s onyx fingernails dug sharply into his hand.

“I said you’re wrong,” Eren repeated, locking eyes with Jean heatedly.

“Ow! Eren, what the hell? Stop!”

“You _are_ fragile,” said Eren. “And you _will_ die.” The music had dropped off again, and the animals watched the sudden turn of events anxiously.

“Let go!”

Eren finally let go, and Jean cradled his hand to his chest, keeping his eyes on Eren.

“What the fuck is your problem?” Jean snapped. “You’re so moody!”

“Are you serious?” Eren snapped. “ _You_ are my problem. Saying shit like ‘I’m not going to die,’ because for some reason, humans can't get it into their big fucking heads that they can die. You aren’t immortal, Jean.”

“Scrapes aren’t going to kill me.”

“I’m talking about eventually dying.”

“I was starting to figure,” said Jean bitterly. Everything was slowly clicking into place, and Jean wanted to kick himself for not figuring it out sooner. This was the final reason why Eren wouldn’t come with him. It probably wasn’t as big of an issue as the fear and self-loathing issue, but it was the last issue Eren was clinging onto.

“I mean look at you,” Eren said, gesturing to the stubble on Jean’s face. “You have the signs of aging all over the place.”

“Hey. We humans are pretty sensitive about our age.”

“This isn’t a joke, Jean.”

“I know, but since when has this whole I’m-a-human, you’re-a-god thing been an issue?”

“It’s always been an issue, but you just won't give up on me! Dancing me to freedom was a little obvious and overdramatic, don’t you think?”

Jean’s heart sank. “When did you figure it out?” he asked, looking dejected.

“As soon as we left the nesting area,” Eren said, crossing his arms.

At the words _nesting area_ , Jean’s thoughts were yanked away from the argument in favor of picturing them building a love nest together.

“Oh,” said Jean, feeling a strange mixture of embarrassment and giddiness.

“What are you embarrassed about _now_?” asked Eren, annoyed. “I’m trying to have a serious conversation here.”

“Me too,” said Jean, but he was already starting to giggle.

“Jean!”

“Sorry! It’s just, sometimes your word choices are incredible.”

Eren tried not to grow flustered. “You aren’t listening to me at all.”

“I am! I get it, you want to come but you’re afraid of living without me after I die-”

“I am not _afraid_ ,” Eren quickly clarified.

“-but if you stay here and I go, aren’t you just living without me sooner than you have to?” Jean asked. It wasn’t the best argument, and Jean realized his mistake as soon as he put the hopelessness of Eren’s inevitable fate into words. “It’s going to happen either way,” he added, making it worse.

Lizard was climbing onto Eren’s shoulder, just as a squirrel jumped into Jean’s hair and reached down to slap him on the nose.

“Want me to bite him?” hissed Lizard.

Eren shook his head, watching Jean try and grab the squirrel.

“I didn't mean it to sound like that!” Jean said, talking more to the squirrel than to Eren.

“Jean,” Eren said loudly, getting back his attention. “You should go.”

“But-”

“Please. Not today,” Eren cut him off tiredly.

Jean jumped at the chance to change Eren’s mood. “So tomorrow?”

But Eren didn’t respond, turning away and heading back into the temple. Jean stepped to follow him, but the squirrel swatted at his eyelashes.

“Okay, okay,” Jean said, rubbing his eye. “I’ll try again tomorrow.” He watched Eren disappear, and then, feeling a failure, dragged his feet through the crowd of critters toward the door.

***

The next day, Eren woke up to find one of their old silver vases full of flowers at the base of the pedestal.

He slipped down and landed softly on his bare feet. After straightening out his tunic slowly, he glanced down at the flowers and gave them a small _hmph!_ , walking purposefully past them and into the fountain room for a bath.

“Wait!” a little voice from the side of the vase yelled after him. “I have stuff to tell you!”

It was butterfly language, but Eren ignored it and stripped off his tunic, leaving the necklace and bracelets on. He folded his tunic carefully and set it to the side. Then he paused.

“Jean?” Eren asked, feeling someone’s eyes on him.

Black Widow slipped down from the ceiling beams by a shimmery thread, and Eren took care not to splash her as he got in the bath.

“Just me,” she said sheepishly. “Jean is somewhere in the forest. Did you like the flowers?”

“No I did not, and why is he out there?” Eren said stubbornly.

“You mean why isn’t he in here?” she asked.

Eren shot her a look of warning and picked up a stone from the bottom of the fountain, then began vigorously scrubbing the bottom of his foot. “No, I meant why is he out there?” he asked again.

“The poor boy is giving you space,” she said. “He asked the pigs to deliver the flowers this morning.”

“How? He can’t even talk to them!” said Eren, the stone falling into the water with a _plop_.

“But we can listen.”

“And you’re just doing what he says?” Eren asked heatedly.

“Are you jealous?”

“Who would I be jealous of?”

Black Widow paused and narrowed her eyes. “I don’t know, who _are_ you jealous of?”

Eren found the stone again and moved onto the next foot. “No one. I just can’t believe he’s got you all on his side.”

“But he’s so kind-hearted,” said Black Widow.

“He’s fooling you with that smile,” grumbled Eren.

“He does have a winning smile, doesn’t he.”

“Can we stop talking about Jean?”

“What do you want to talk about instead?”

“I don’t know, whatever we used to talk about.”

“You used to talk about flowers sometimes. Especially in the spring.”

“Good, let’s talk about those.”

“But it’s autumn.”

“Then let’s talk about fall perennials,” said Eren, determined to forget the idiot smiling in his head.

“…Jean got you some fall perennials,” said Black Widow.

 _Plop!_ “I just said not to talk about him!”

“Did you even look at the flowers that he found for you?” she pressed.

Eren picked up the stone once more. “I glanced at them.”

“You should go back and actually look.”

“Why does it matter?”

Black Widow grinned her evil little spider grin. “Because we made sure they were flowers you’ve never seen before.”

_Plop!_

Eren dropped the stone, forgetting his anger and his tunic, and ran back to the main room. Black Widow scuttled quickly behind him, happy to see him finally excited.

When he got to the pedestal, Eren crouched low, amazed at the pink flowers standing proudly in the tall silver vase. It was true; he had never seen these before.

A tiny white butterfly on the rim of the vase cleared his throat. “These are from the base of the mountain,” he announced.

“Oh,” said Eren, blinking. “Hello.”

“Oh!” said the butterfly, quite indignantly. “How _kind_ of you to _finally_ grace me with your presence, _great_ _majesty over the mountain_.”

Eren frowned at the sarcasm dripping from its straw-like tongue. “I was going to apologize, but now I want to squish you.”

“Ha! Squish me! _Squish_ me!” The butterfly was hysterical. “I’ll have you know that even if you _squish_ me, my beauty will forever outshine yours!”

“I’ll admit that your design is a little plain,” said Eren honestly. “But I never said you weren’t beautiful.”

The snow-colored wings fluttered, taken aback. “That is enough flattery, young man!” it slurped. “Now put some clothes on like a normal human being, for hibiscus sake! And watch the water droplets, I just had my wings re-powdered.”

Still crouching low, Eren scooted back on the balls of his feet so he wouldn’t drip near the butterfly. “I’ll ignore the clothing comment, considering the fact that I’m not human,” said Eren flatly.

“You’re as human as you want to be,” said the butterfly. “I’m quite human myself, you know.”

“Sure,” said Eren, humoring him. “Now what were those things you wanted to tell me?”

“What things?”

“The things you mentioned when-”

“ _Oh_ ,” the butterfly interrupted dramatically. “The _things_ I mentioned when you so _rudely_ walked away from me? _Those_ things?”

Eren sighed. “Yes, those things.”

The butterfly cleared his throat a second time. “ _Ahem_. These are Fairy Trumpets. They are usually red but can crossbreed with a type of white flower of great beauty and become a soft pink, as seen here. This is not a flower suited to my personal palette, but hummingbirds, _those sluts_ , seem to love them.”

“Cool,” said Eren, genuinely intrigued.

“ _Cool_ is an understatement, my dear boy. I think the appropriate word would be something along the lines of _resplendent_.”

“Why are they called Fairy Trumpets?”

“Because they’re used as trumpets for fairies.”

“What’s a fairy?”

“A tiny human that can fly.”

“For real?”

“Not for real. Fairies are made up.”

“Oh. Then what’s a trumpet?”

“A musical instrument.”

“Are those real?”

“Yes.”

“But if fairies are fake, who plays the Fairy Trumpets?”

The butterfly was about to fly away and save himself from this horrible naive being looming over him, but he caught all eight eyes of the terrifying black spider at once. She hung right behind Eren’s head, and pounded her little front fists together just like she had after Jean caught him in the forest. The butterfly swallowed thickly, remembering his promise with a human (prompted by threats by the spider) to teach Eren anything he was curious about.

“The thing about trumpets,” he said, climbed to the tippy-top of the highest flower in the vase and settling into teacher mode, “is that they are actually a human invention.”

“Flowers don’t come from humans,” Eren argued.

And so, the question-and-answer went on for some time before the butterfly ran out of answers and had to start making them up. After all, a butterfly from the base of the mountain doesn’t really know all that much more than a butterfly from the top of the mountain.

As he curled up on the pedestal, Eren thought of the humans who built other people out of snow. Half-asleep, he wondered if Jean’s parents had made him out of snow. He would have to ask…

Just before daybreak, Eren woke up in the middle of a stampede.

Well, a “stampede” that consisted of ladybugs, one spider, a couple snakes, a lizard, a theatrical group of beetles, various birds, two pigs, some scorpions, a pack of squirrels, one buck, and a very confused white butterfly.

The pedestal shook, and Eren jumped off, trying to calm everyone down.

“What’s happening?” he shouted, trying to find meaning in their squawks and stomps.

“Jean’s in trouble!” screamed Ladybug in his ear.

“He was teaching us how to take stuff without anyone noticing,” cried a squirrel. “We were going to bring you back a map, but he got captured and we dropped it.”

“He was teaching you how to steal?” asked Eren.

“He called it permanently borrowing,” sobbed another squirrel.

“We have to go rescue him!” pleaded Ladybug.

Eren was already walking across the room toward the passageway. “Where is he?” he asked.

“With the humans,” said Bucky.

Eren hesitated. “Which humans?”

“From the village to the south,” he said.

“Oh.” Eren stopped.

“Keep going!” said Ladybug desperately.

“Are they doing anything horrible to him?” asked Eren.

“They locked him up!”

“Anything else?”

Ladybug fluttered her wings in agitation. “They gave him awful, itchy clothes to wear.”

“Alright calm down. Jean’s not in trouble,” Eren told them, relieved. “Don’t freak me out like that, okay?”

“We can’t just leave him though,” Dove cooed from above.

“You did,” Eren pointed out, and Dove bristled when he realized it was true.

“But I’m just a simple bird,” said Dove. “What could I have done?”

“You could’ve pecked their eyes out,” said Ladybug smartly.

“You could’ve done something too, then!” said Dove.

“Like what?”

“I don’t know, landed in their soup or something!”

Ladybug twisted her antennas, looking ready for a fight. Eren decided to intervene before things got worse.

“Everybody hold on, and stop crying,” he snapped to the squirrels in particular. “The villagers gave Jean to me as an offering, so let’s just wait for them to bring him back.”

“What if they don’t?” asked Ladybug.

“Then I’ll shake the mountain until they do,” said Eren. He caught his reflection in the dusty mirror by Jean’s old sleeping spot, and twisted a lock of hair self-consciously. The villagers could be here any minute with Jean, and Eren looked like shit.

“You seem nervous,” said Bucky.

It was true; Eren’s stomach fluttered with anticipation as he stared hard at his reflection.

“I’m just hungry,” he replied. Instead of finding food, however, he made his way to the fountain room and started to strip.

“What are you doing?” asked Dove, following him along with the rest of the creatures.

“Washing my clothes. I can't look like a complete slob when they get here,” said Eren, stepping into the fountain. Ladybug flew to Bucky’s antlers to find refuge from the water.

“He’s never cared about his appearance before,” Ladybug said to Bucky.

“ _C'est l'amour_ ,” said the little white butterfly, landing beside Ladybug.

“Why are you still here?” Ladybug complained.

***

“It’s too bad about the old jail cells,” said Armin, looking sadly across the meadow at the barn being guarded by several villagers. “I don’t like the thought of keeping that thief locked in their with Herman.”

“Your precious horse is going to be fine,” said Mikasa, not looking up from the list of crops and numbers she was examining.

“Why should Herman have to suffer? It’s not his fault it rained so freakishly much this year.”

“If I remember correctly, it was Herman’s _owner_ who had the bright idea to dig prison cells into the ground in the first place. So if anyone’s going to be blamed for our cells being washed away, it’s you, Armin.”

“It made sense,” said Armin, using his staff to draw a box in the dirt beside the bench. “Less walls, less work.”

Mikasa gave up examining the list and folded the parchment carefully, placing it in her belt pouch. “If you’re so concerned about the thief, why don’t we lock him up in your house instead? Would that make you feel better?”

Armin slumped. “No.”

“Then stop complaining.” Mikasa rubbed her temples, trying to erase the stress of the upcoming harvest. “I can’t believe the prophecy came true,” she said after a moment.

“It hasn’t completely come true yet,” Armin warned her. “Just because we found the idiot in a tree does not mean he’s the chosen one.”

Mikasa looked worriedly up at the green mountain peaking above the rooftops behind them. “Why is it taking so long for Eren to retrieve his slave? He should be here by now.”

Armin rolled his staff between his palms, spinning a crater into the dirt. “Maybe because fate is bullshit and Eren is _choosing_ not to come racing down the mountain.”

“Are you saying that the prophecy is bullshit?” Mikasa asked flatly.

“All I’m saying is that a seven-hundred-year-old prophecy might be defective.”

“Okay, fine. Even assuming there might be something wrong with the prophecy, why would Eren _choose_ not to come after Jean?”

“Maybe he doesn’t care enough.”

“He cared enough to keep Jean alive this whole time,” said Mikasa.

“Then maybe Eren knows Jean isn’t actually in trouble,” said Armin. “Eren won’t break past the barrier just because we’re giving his boyfriend a time out in the barn.”

Mikasa didn’t reply, and they both sat on the bench in thoughtful silence. The grass in the meadow swayed in the warm wind, and a bird cried out from the direction of the mountain.

A good twenty minutes passed before Mikasa broke the silence. “We could execute Jean this weekend,” she suggested.

“We can’t exactly kill off our prophesized hero, Chief.”

“As long as Eren saves his ass before the knife reaches his throat, everything will work out.”

“Sounds too plucky.”

“No, it’s perfect,” Mikasa insisted. “This weekend is the seventh century offering, right?”

“Right,” Armin said, becoming nervous when he remembered the extra offering they had to give.

“So while you’re up there, you might as well let it slip that his boy toy is getting the axe.”

Armin sat back and hummed thoughtfully. “I liked the knife to the throat idea better, though.”

“Fine, whatever,” said Mikasa. “Knife or axe, Eren will come.”

“Hopefully,” said Armin.

“Stop being such a downer or I’ll start calling you Pessy.”

***

Eren spent all day waiting, and then all night waiting. When nothing happened and no one came, he spent the next day pacing around the temple, occasionally revisiting the mirror to make sure he looked presentable.

By the end of the second day, Eren realized he still was not wearing his circlet.

“Ah,” he said aloud, knowing it would make him look godlier in front of the villagers. He stepped away from the mirror and set out to look for it, calling out to his friends for help. Reptiles and insects dug through the piles of treasure and rubble scattered throughout the temple, while anything that could fly was up in the beams. Bucky splashed clumsily in the fountain, but could not find it there either.

Looking for the circlet at first was rather dull, but without reason, it escalated into a race where everyone was running frantically around and making bets with one another.

“The pigs have to gather breakfast tomorrow if we get it first!” announced the squirrels.

The pigs squealed at the unfairness of it all.

“Don’t bother looking,” cooed Dove. “I have the sharpest eyes in this place.”

“You’re blinder than all of us, old man,” twittered a blue jay.

Lizard watched lazily from Eren’s shoulder. “Sssso immature,” she hissed.

“Are you getting bigger?” Eren asked her, his back starting to ache.

Lizard shrugged. “Maybe I’m pregnant.”

“ _What_?” Eren stopped his own search and twirled around, despite the fact that Lizard was on his shoulder so she moved with him.

“Kidding!” she gripped his clean tunic to keep from falling. “I’m finally hitting my growthhh ssspurt, thhhat’ssss all.”

“ _Growth spurt_?” Eren asked disbelievingly. He thought back on how tiny she had been when she first showed up on the snowy front steps, nearly dead from the cold. “You’ve been here like eight years… How old are you?”

She shrugged again. “I losssst count.”

“Either way, you’re old for a lizard,” said Eren.

“And you’re old for a human,” said Lizard.

“I’m not a human.”

“And I’m not a lizzzard.”

“What-?”

“Found it!” The pack of squirrels scampered over to Eren, holding a flower crown up to him proudly.

Eren recognized it immediately; it was the one he had woven for Jean, but Jean had thrown it down during their fight.

“Give me that,” he said dryly. The squirrels handed it over happily, while the pigs looked on in defeat.

“Do we win?” asked the squirrels.

“No.” Eren pulled the flower crown gently apart, letting the flowers he had so carefully woven together fall to his feet one by one.

The squirrels rushed to him, pulling at the hem of his tunic and howling, “Don't! What are you doing? We found that for you!”

“I don’t care,” said Eren. He looked away from their teary-eyed faces and said, “The search is over. I don't need that stupid headpiece anyway.”

“But don’t you want to impress Jean?” asked the smallest squirrel, putting on a brave face as he craned back to look at Eren.

Eren bent over him darkly. “The _last_ person I need to impress is that _scumbag_ ,” he said angrily.

The squirrel’s eyes welled up, his little nose quivering. “I like Jean!” he cried. “He appreciates us, but all you ever do is get angry! I hate you!”

It ran the other way, and the rest of the squirrels followed. Eren watched them disappear into the passage, too shocked to call out after them.

“What the hell was that?” he asked after a minute, half of the flower crown still hanging from his hand. He looked around for an answer, but everyone was suddenly trying very hard to look busy even though they had nothing to do.

“Looksss like it’sss time to reevaluate your life choisssess,” said Lizard.

“Shut up,” said Eren moodily.

“You were nissser when Jean wasss around.”

“I said shut-” Eren cut himself off. “I- sorry.”

“It’sss fine,” said Lizard. “I’m usssed to it.”

“That makes it worse,” mumbled Eren. “Can you leave me alone for a while? I’ll be on my pedestal if you need me.”

Lizard frowned at his choice of location but didn’t argue. She hopped off his shoulder and scuttled away, leaving Eren in the rapidly emptying room.

Eren paused at the base of the pedestal, then decided to keep walking, stopping where Jean used to sleep. He sat down cross-legged in the unkempt moss, and then leaned forward until his breath fogged up the mirror.

He stayed like that for hours, staring at himself and the things he wore, at the temple behind him and at the treasure around him. Then as the room grew dark, his mind filled with Jean.

“He’s late,” Eren said to himself. A bird screamed in the distance, calling out to its mate somewhere in the forest.

***

The morning sun was bright. Too bright. Armin swallowed nervously as he ascended the final stair on the mountain path before the ground flattened out across the overgrown garden in front of the temple, his staff clinking and seashells clattering.

“I make too much noise,” Armin mumbled to himself. It was custom for the temple priest to go up to the temple alone and offer a golden bracelet once every one hundred years. Eren’s century birthdays were celebrated with an offering, while his yearly birthdays were overlooked, meaning this was the first time Armin was making an offering without any backup.

He stopped in front of the temple steps, trying not to throw up.

Eren, of course, heard the telltale noises of the temple priest approaching. He tried to act cool, but he too was feeling nauseous from nerves. He glanced one last time in the mirror and before rushing down the passages and toward the front hall.

Eren paused just behind the archway to the hall. “Okay. It’s only Jean,” he reminded himself. “No need to have a heart attack. I saw him like, three days ago.”

“What am I so nervous about?” Armin, meanwhile, was asking himself. “He’s never eaten anyone, especially not a priest… right?”

Eren took a deep breath and stepped out into the breezy hall.

Armin gripped his stick in surprise. He wanted to shout something like, _Don’t shoot the messenger!_ His thoughts were derailed, however, by the image of beauty standing beyond the fluttering paper seals.

Eren looked amazing. Godly, even. Armin knew Eren was a god, of course, but he had never seen him actually look the part. Jade light reflected blindingly from his eyes, and he stood expectant and stately, with an outfit that was cleaner than Armin had ever seen it. His nails and jewelry looked polished to shine, and Armin found himself feeling more afraid than ever.

Eren frowned when the silence lasted too long. Why was the priest here alone? Eren shifted to the right a bit, trying to see beyond Armin, but the garden and the mountain path appeared to be empty.

“Where is everyone?” Eren asked. By everyone, he meant Jean.

Armin jumped. “E-Eren-” he stammered. “I-I mean, oh great and powerful mountain god! You look great, I mean… _wow_.”

Eren’s gaze swept the emptiness around the priest again. “Why are you here?” he said, his voice laced with disappointment.

“Oh, right!” Armin hands flew to his side pocket, his staff clattering to the ground. Armin noisily picked it back up and then reached into his pocket with only one hand, and pulled out a golden bracelet.

“It’s your, uh… seven-hundredth birthday?” Armin said, suddenly feeling like he should have brought a cake along. Did the last priest bring Eren a birthday cake? Did they even have birthday cakes one hundred years ago?

“ _What_?”

Armin approached the temple cautiously. “It’s your birthday,” he repeated, his eyes locked on the identical bracelets covering Eren’s wrists. “I’m here to present the seventh offering.”

“It’s not my birthday,” Eren said.

Armin halted. Had he gotten the day wrong?

“… _Is_ it?” Eren asked.

Armin looked back up at Eren’s face, unsettled by the expression he found there.

“You didn’t know?” Armin asked.

Eren shook his head slowly. When had he stopped keeping track of time? When was the last time he added a tally to the wall?

He already knew the answer. Eren looked at his bracelets uncomfortably, suddenly wanting to take them off. He didn’t want another reminder of how long he had suffered. He wanted Jean.

He clenched his fists and locked eyes with the priest. “Where’s Jean?” he asked.

Armin sighed, relieved. He was wondering how he would bring up the execution naturally, but Eren just saved him the effort.

“We’re going to kill him today,” Armin said bluntly. “He’s going to be sacrificed to you, the way we should have done it in the first place.”

“ _What_?”

“We are executing him,” Armin said clearly.

“ _Why_?”

“To finish this year’s offering once and for all. We couldn’t just give him back, seeing as he could just run away again.”

Eren went pale, or as pale as his bronzed skin would allow, but he didn’t move. He was terrified, but he was also angry. A small squeak emitted from the steps between Armin and Eren, and they both looked down to see a tiny squirrel.

 _Squeeeak? Squeeeak!_ (“What are you waiting for? Go!”)

“But-” Eren cleared his throat and said, _Squeak click squeak._

 _Click click click!_ (“Use your common sense! Jean is dying!”)

 _Squeak?_ asked Eren.

 _Squeak click click!_ (“It’s okay to get angry right now, stupid!”)

Armin looked up at the sky and said, “Sorry to interrupt, but by the position of the sun I’d say Jean has about… ten minutes left.”

The air split in a crack of thunder. Armin flew back, landing in some bushes. When he struggled to an upright position, he could see Eren running at the sealed entrance of the temple, and with a scream, the mountain god threw himself at the barrier without hesitation.

There was a small _pop!_ and Eren’s momentum took him straight past the seals. Expecting some sort of resistance but meeting none, Eren fell down the steps, tumbling through the tangled brush and crashing into Armin.

“Oof!” Armin said, which was the understatement of the century.

Eren wasted no time on the dazed and probably injured priest, pushing Armin further into the bushes as he broke through the tangled branches and barreled down into the mountain path, yelling and snorting and whistling and howling.

Animals rushed out of the wilderness around the temple, passing Armin in pursuit of Eren. Armin nearly wet himself when a majestic buck leapt over the bush he was still occupying. The ground rumbled and more animals continued to run past. A chorus of howls announced a pack of wolves joining in somewhere further down, and Armin felt the color drain from his face once he realized what he had done.

Eren was going to attack the village, and he was calling on every animal he had ever met for help.

***

While Armin had been trudging up the mountain path, Jean had experienced a very different kind of morning than he was used to.

The villagers dragged him out of the barn shortly after sun-up, stripped him of his clothes, and threw him in a feeding trough filled with ice-cold water. He fought to break free while Trevor, who had been keeping Jean company in captivity, squawked uselessly overhead. Two huge men were called over, and they held Jean down in the water while a group of fussy old women proceeded to scold him through what turned out to be nothing more than a normal bath.

Leaving the trough more disgruntled than clean, Jean was then given wool pants, a jacket, and leather shoes to wear. Trevor watched through the window as Jean was instructed to sit on a cushioned chair inside a cozy little room filled with sharp tools and other metal instruments. Mistaking the room for a torture chamber, Jean threw another violent fit until the same two men who had held him down through his bath came in and chained him to the chair. An elderly man wearing glasses came in and offered Jean a sweet. Jean spit on the candy in reply, and the man sadly threw the candy away.

“Don’t worry, this won’t hurt,” he trembled, and he began trimming Jean’s hair.

Looking fresh but feeling downright rude, Jean followed the next group of villagers out into a clearing, which separated the village from edge of the forest. Jean spotted a gap in the trees there, which marked the beginning of the mountain path that lead to Eren’s temple. There was a big stone slab in the center of the clearing, and Jean remembered marching past when he had been part of the spring offering. Beside the slab was a large basin filled with blood, and Jean shouted, ready to fight for a third time.

The blood, however, turned out to be body paint. Jean would have hung his head low in embarrassment, but the familiar group of fussy old women scolded him into keeping his chin up so they could paint a continuous red line from the center of his forehead to the dip between his collarbones. Trevor sat on the stone slab and cleaned his feathers, bored with how today was turning out.

When she was finished, the plump woman holding the paintbrush sighed and sat back. “Last time we painted him, the chief let us have so much creative freedom.” Remembering the doodle of a butter pat on his stomach, Jean mentally thanked the chief for taking away their creative freedom.

Just then, a sound like thunder crackled down the mountain. A few moments later, the trees at the edge of the forest groaned, rippling toward the village as a blast of air caused a few of the elderly women to stumble around.

“It’s time,” a beautiful voice rang across the clearing. “Is he ready?”

Jean craned around and saw the chief with onyx hair striding toward them alone.

“We did everything you asked,” said the plump woman. “We even marked his windpipe for you.”

“Huh?” Jean started. But before he could react to the knife in the chief’s hand, the two burly men were back, and they cuffed Jean’s wrists together and wrestled him over to the base of the stone slab, where they tied Jean with a length of rope and hurried away.

“Get back to the safety of your houses,” Mikasa said to the group. “Lock your doors and stay out of sight. Things could get ugly.”

Jean struggled against his binds, and Trevor fluttered down and started pecking at the rope.

“Shit, shit, shit,” he said, writhing in vain. He could hear the chief’s footsteps closing in, and he twisted toward the sound, trying to see where the knife was.

The chief came into view as she walked around the stone slab and stopped beside Jean.

“Shit,” Jean panted, slowing his struggles. “It had been such a nice morning, too.”

Trevor flew nervously away when Mikasa kneeled down so she was eye level with Jean. She dropped the knife and put both her hands on Jean’s shoulders. Jean’s eyes flickered from the knife in the dirt to her defenseless posture, and he realized he could probably kick her hard enough to knock her out. He glanced up at her face to look for an opening, but her expression caught him off-guard.

Even more unsettling than her solemn features was the worry in her honest eyes.

Her words came sharp and quick: “I have over five hundred innocent people living in that village. Eren has a good heart but a quick temper, which you undoubtedly know by now. However, Eren believes I am about to do something horrible, and his temper might win out over his heart. Down here in the village, we have experienced your influence on Eren in these last peaceful months. It is because of this peace that I know you can unlock the goodness in his heart. So when Eren comes down here and is blinded by his rage, I am putting my complete faith in you to help his good heart vanquish his anger. I am placing the lives of my five hundred villagers in your care. Do you understand?” Mikasa stared earnestly at the bewildered man before her.

“I’m sorry,” said Jean, “but what the hell are you talking about?”

_Clack, clack, clack, clack._

Mikasa and Jean both looked over at two pebbles clacking against once another in the dirt.

“There’s no time,” said Mikasa, grasping the knife again and standing up.

“No time for what?” asked Jean, as the ground beneath him continued to rumble. “What’s happening?”

Mikasa didn’t answer him. She climbed onto the stone slab behind him and turned to face the mountain. He could see her shadow holding the knife over him, standing tall even as the ground shook harder.

“Earthquake?” Jean asked, overwhelmed into a state of confusion. “Are you killing me to prevent an earthquake?”

A chorus of howls and wild squeals came from the forest on the face of the mountain, and the trees were moving and breaking in a dusty wave that rolled downward.

Mikasa’s shadow raised the dagger high, and Mikasa’s voice shouted, “A sacrifice to the mountain god!” Jean didn’t know if he should look at the shadow or the edge of the forest, which was collapsing into a stampede of wild creatures.

The sky turned black with insects that swarmed overhead. Mikasa’s shadow disappeared with the sun, but Jean knew she was still there when she grabbed his hair and pulled his head back, exposing the red line that followed his windpipe.

“No!” a voice Jean barely recognized as Eren’s sizzled through the air like static, and then Eren himself burst through the trees behind a pack of snarling wolves. He spared Jean a single glance, and then locked his gaze on the chief, his jade orbs unwavering as he pulled his arms back and pushed them forward with another sizzling shout.

Jean felt a surge of heat, and Mikasa released his hair with a vicious hiss. The knife she had been holding dropped to the dirt, glowing red.

Eren leapt over Jean’s head and knocked Mikasa backward off the slab. Jean’s skull rattled violently against the stone as hooves and paws pounded into the dirt, rushing past the three humans and stampeding into the village beyond.

“Don’t touch him,” Jean could hear Eren snarling. Somewhere in the background, a village bell started ringing.

“Stop,” Mikasa coughed heavily. “Call off your army.” There was a thump, and Mikasa grunted.

Jean tried to twist around to see what Eren was doing to her, but all he could see were about a million insects and the damn stone slab he was tied to.

“Eren!” he called, finally finding his voice. “Stop it!”

Mikasa grunted again.

“Eren, whatever you're doing, stop it!”

Eren didn’t answer. Shouts were rising in the village, and Jean was helpless against the chains and rope.

Jean’s voice rose an octave in desperation. “ _Eren!_ ”

“ _What?_ Sheesh, you’re annoying,” Eren said, appearing in front of him.

Jean jumped. “Ah!!

“What do you want?”

“Untie me,” Jean demanded.

“Why? So you can run away and get caught again?”

“I wasn’t running away!” Jean said, unable to calm the hysteria in his voice. “After all we’ve been through, you really think I’d run away? I _love_ you, Eren.”

Eren averted his gaze. “Alright, I get it.” The chains fell away from Jean’s wrists, and Eren broke the rope rather hastily. “No need to get all mushy or anything.”

Jean realized Eren was embarrassed. “Now is _definitely_ not the time to get embarrassed. Look at what you’re doing,” Jean said, gesturing to the village and to Mikasa, who was on her hands and knees coughing.

“She tried to kill you.”

“You left the temple.”

Eren ground his teeth angrily, still averting his gaze. “Don’t change the subject.”

“I’m not,” Jean said carefully, stepping closer to him. “You were always afraid of becoming a monster when you left the temple. Now you’re out, and you’re acting like a monster.”

Eren was trying hard not to cry. “But she tried to _kill_ you.”

“But she didn’t kill me. I’m right here.”

“You almost died.”

“But I didn’t, so there’s no reason to hurt anyone.”

“I love you and you almost died,” Eren said. “That’s a reason.”

Jean wrapped his arms around Eren and pulled him into the biggest hug he had ever given anyone in his life.

“I love you, too,” said Jean.

Eren made a disgusted noise and hugged him back. “Stop making me cry, you asshole.”

A blood-curdling scream from the village shattered the moment. Eren pulled away slightly and looked at Jean, startled.

“Stay here,” Eren said, and then disappeared.

It took Jean a moment, but when he finally registered what Eren said, he mumbled “ _Like hell_ ,” and ran for the village.

Wolves ran past him the other way in retreat, and Jean took it as a good sign before he reached the first house. It was hard to see, as the animals had stirred up dirt and dust and whatever else now hung in the air.

Two streets in, Jean spotted Bucky nibbling at some flowers in the window box. The owners of the house were watching fearfully from their second-story window.

“Bucky!” Jean shouted, relieved to see a familiar face.

Bucky looked up. “It’s Buck,” he corrected the human, but of course Jean couldn’t understand.

“Bucky, we’ve got to stop the other creatures before someone gets hurt.”

Bucky blinked at him slowly, signaling his apathy.

“Never mind. Enjoy your flowers.” Jean took off past the unhelpful buck, winding his way through the cobblestone streets. Screams signaled a commotion up ahead, and Jean turned a corner, following the noise.

There, in the middle of the street, a girl was holding a squirrel upside-down by the tail.

Her mother screamed. “Put that wretched thing _down_!”

Jean stopped running and sighed. So far, the worst the forest creatures had done to the villagers was scare them and eat some flowers. _Worst rescue battle ever_ , Jean couldn’t help but think.

“Jean, my hero!” said the squirrel.

“Stop squeaking, you’re scaring the mom,” said Jean, approaching the little girl slowly. “Excuse me, miss, but do you think you could let that poor little guy go?”

“No!” screamed the girl, shaking the squirrel. “I want to keep her as a pet!”

The squirrel curled up and bit the little girl’s hand.

“Ahhh! Mommy!” the girl cried, dropping the squirrel. The squirrel skittered over to Jean and ran up his leg.

“Get that monster away from us!” the mother shouted at Jean.

Jean exchanged unsympathetic looks with the squirrel and then ran past the mother and her crying child. Since the debris in the air was starting to clear, Jean figured that Eren was already done getting the bigger animals out of the village.

A few houses down, Jean heard another scream.

“ _Spider!_ Kill it, kill it!”

Jean barreled through the open doorway, immediately spotting two men- one screaming, and the other one swinging around a broom.

“Where’s the spider?” Jean asked them.

The two men paused what they were doing in order to inspect the young intruder with red paint on his face and a squirrel on his shoulder.

“Who the hell are you?” the one with the broom asked.

Jean didn’t grace them with a response, spotting the spider in the corner. He ran for it and held out his hand.

“Come on,” he coaxed it.

“Oh, Jean,” said Black Widow. “This is twice you’ve saved me from death, you big hunk.”

“Back off old timer,” said the squirrel. “He’s _my_ hero.”

“Now, now,” said Black Widow gently. “We both know he’s meant for Eren and Eren alone.”

Jean, unaware of the conversation taking place on his shoulder, left the baffled men behind and returned to the scream-filled streets.

He searched high and low for creatures needing saving, not once finding a situation where the humans were the ones in danger. By the time he reached the other side of the village, Jean saved thirty-three other creatures in peril, including Trevor, who had managed to get his beak stuck in a flask, and a fruit fly that hadn’t even been part of the original stampede. Jean sent all of them back to the forest, with the exception of Trevor, who was too drunk to fly.

Exhausted, Jean decided to take a break. He sat down on a bench overlooking a meadow, and wondered where Eren could be.

A tall woman ran out of the barn Jean had been locked in. “There’s a damn lizard scaring all the horses,” she shouted to a shorter woman standing on Jean’s side of the meadow. “Herman is throwing an absolute fit.”

“Where’s the stable boy?” the shorter woman asked.

“He’s in there trying to catch the damn thing.”

Trevor tweeted in Jean’s general direction.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jean said, heaving himself to his feet. He picked Trevor up before the bird could wobble off the bench, and they made their way across the field to the barn.

***

Eren ran from rooftop to rooftop, searching for Lizard. She was the only one she hadn’t found yet, and he had no idea where she could be.

“Lizard?” he called over and over, but she never answered him.

Just when he was about to give in and show himself to the humans below, a plume of smoke rose up over the rooftops.

“Fire!” someone down in the streets screamed.

“The barn is on fire!”

“Get the horses!”

“Erennnnn!” a bird voice stood out among the human ones, and Eren saw a blue jay flying unsteadily away from the barn. Eren jumped over to meet him on the rooftop nearest to the meadow.

“Trevor?” Eren asked, letting the blue jay land in his hands. “I didn’t know you were here.”

“Eyy! Since when d’you know m’name?”

Eren frowned at the way the bird was speaking. “I’ve always known your name. Did you inhale some smoke over there or something?”

“Smoke?” Trevor, looking alarmed, turned back and peered at the way he had come. “Oh yeah… _Oh!_ Erennnnn!”

“ _What?_ ”

“Sheen’s in trouble!”

“Jean?”

“Yeah, Sheen! Lizard burped and made fiyahh!”

“Fire?”

“Yeah, fiyahhh! And then dis crazy bitch horse kicked, boom, knocked Sheen out.”

Eren dropped Trevor, who rolled around lazily in the dirt.

“Well whaddya waitin’ for? Go save ‘im,” the drunk blue jay said to no one.

Eren was at the barn door in less than a second. Smoke billowed out from the slits in the walls, and flames licked up the sides of the wood. He could hear horses yelling for help inside.

He took a breath, ready to blast the doors inward, but smoke filled his lungs and he started hacking. Eren backed up away from the door and tried again. The doors rattled, but nothing happened. The smoke was blurring Eren’s vision, making it difficult to concentrate.

“Move!” a familiar voice shouted at him, and Eren jumped out of the way, and Bob the Boar came barreling through with the temple priest on his back. Armin whooped as they broke through the burning barn walls and were engulfed by the flames on the other side.

Eren was sure he had hallucinated the whole thing, until he crawled through the broken wall and saw Armin freeing the horses, his ornamented sleeve protecting his mouth and nose from the smoke. The horses galloped past Eren and through opening, escaping to the clean air outside.

“I went to wish you a happy birthday,” wheezed Bob, “but the only person I could find at the temple was that runt over there. He told me what happened, and by the time we got here, the fighting was already over!”

“There wasn’t much fighting,” coughed Eren distractedly. Where the hell was Jean?

“Herman!” Armin shouted, running for a chocolate-colored horse on the far end of the barn. Eren noticed the horse was nosing at something lying near its hooves on the barn floor.

It was Jean. The red paint was now smeared to one side of his face, and he was slowly regaining consciousness. Lizard had her front legs up on his nose, and she was hiccupping through diamond tears.

“Wait!” Bob tried to stop Eren, but a loud groaning of wood drowned out his voice. Just as Eren and Armin reached Herman, Lizard, and Jean, the roof of the barn collapsed above them.

Outside, the villagers were running around splashing buckets of water and moist dirt on the flames to stop them from reaching their crops. The groaning and popping of the roof caused them to stop and watch helplessly as the barn caved in.

“Get back!” Mikasa, who was now sporting a black eye, ordered the villagers nearest to the wreckage to stay clear. Dust and flames erupted from the sides of the barn, licking away the meadow grass and turning them to ash.

Heavy steam hissed from inside the crumbling barn, replacing the ash and smoke and seeping in rolling clouds out through the walls to quell the spreading fire.

“What the hell is that?” someone yelled, pointing above the barn.

Jade eyes glinted above the steam cloud, and the mountainous figure unhinged its jaw and roared. The ground shook, and the villagers scattered.

“Holy heck!” Armin screamed, scrambling backward on the soaked barn floor. His horse whinnied back and forth fearfully.

“It’s the mountain god!” The villagers panicked.

“Wait!” Mikasa was trying to calm them down, but the villagers were already running back to their houses to get their weapons.

Jean sat up and gawked at the figure shielding them from the falling planks of wood, and Lizard gripped his shoulder nervously.

“Monster!” a woman shouted.

“Get the metal netting!”

“Jean!” Bob’s voice oinked beside him. “What do we do?”

“We have to get him out of here,” said Jean. He shot over to the wall of the barn that was still intact, and he started climbing the charred ladder that lead up to the storage loft.

“Eren!” he shouted. The figure overhead stomped violently, narrowly missing Armin and Herman. Jean ducked his head as debris fell from the loft, while Lizard hissed and slithered into the front pocket of his jacket.

Jean was halfway up the ladder when the arrows started shooting down from the sky. Below him, Armin was on Herman’s back, yelling at the villagers to stop shooting.

Jean climbed all the way to the top of the ladder and stood himself up on the loft.

“ _Eren!_ ”

He was at eye level with the colossal being. Giant jade orbs turned slowly to find him, and when they did, Jean could see fear welled up inside of them. However, Jean felt his own fear vanish when he recognized the creature as Eren, just as much as his human form was also Eren.

Somewhere inside, Eren freaked out. Jean was seeing him as a monster again. Jean would run away again. He might hurt Jean.

“You idiot,” Jean said softly, holding out his hand.

Eren leaned forward, and Jean touched his hand to Eren’s nose gently. Lizard peeked out from the top of the pocket and burped, emitting a small blob of fire that sizzled in the air between them.

“Let’s get out of here,” Jean said.

Eren roared in response.

***

Escaping the village was easy when Jean could hitch a ride on a three-story tall mountain god. They returned to the temple and gathered a few necessary items- _ahem,_ _gold coins_ \- and set off in a surprisingly awkward manner. They were going on a journey to see the world, and the forest creatures promised to watch over the treasure so they would always have some gold to come back to whenever they ran out.

Eren hadn’t argued leaving the temple. In fact, he hadn’t argued or said anything at all since they started packing up two small leather bags permanently borrowed from the villagers. The squirrels cried and Ladybug sang a parting duet with Black Widow that no one could really hear. Lizard decided to come along, which Eren welcomed and Jean didn’t argue against because you can’t really argue with a _dragon_.

Jean was too giddy to think about Eren’s weird behavior at first, but as the sun started to set, the silence felt wrong. They should be celebrating. Or fighting. Or ferociously making out in the bushes somewhere.

It didn’t help that Eren kept shooting sidelong glances at Jean. Jean couldn’t take it anymore, and was just about to throw Eren against the nearest boulder and kiss the awkwardness out of him when he noticed Eren’s bare neck.

“Where’s your key?”

Eren shrugged. “Lost it somewhere.”

“Where are your bracelets?”

“I got tired of them.”

Jean smiled knowingly. “How are you supposed to know how old you are now?”

Eren shrugged again.

“Eren.”

“Hm?”

“Is something wrong?”

“No.”

“Then why aren’t you talking to me?”

“No reason.”

“Eren.”

Eren groaned. “Nothing! Fuck. You just look really attractive today, okay? Like your hair and stuff.”

Jean rubbed his cleanly-shaven jaw. “Oh. Thanks.”

“Shut up.”

Jean laughed. “That’s it?”

“What do you mean, that’s it?”

“Nothing, I just thought that maybe you hated me now.”

“I don’t hate you.”

“I know,” Jean said smugly. “I think you made yourself clear when you cried for me.”

“I didn’t cry for you!”

“You even told me you love-” Jean’s words were efficiently cut off when Eren kissed him harshly. Jean pulled back. “Ow.”

“Sorry,” Eren said, closing in for a gentler one this time. He sucked on Jean’s bottom lip and then laughed.

“What?” Jean mumbled.

“Nothing,” said Eren, smiling giddily.

Jean narrowed his eyes. “Give me my giddiness back.”

“No way.” Eren bounced away with Lizard on his shoulder, and Jean watched grumpily from behind.

Jean grumbled bitterly under his breath. “We could’ve sold your bracelets for money.”

Lizard rolled her eyes. “You fell in love withhh an idiot, you know.”

“What is it- _she_ saying?” Jean asked, running nervously to catch up. Ever since he found out Lizard was actually a dragon, Jean was trying to get on her good side.

“She called you an idiot again.”

“Well tell it to shut up,” Jean said, deciding dragons were just as bad as any other reptile.

“Nah,” Eren laughed. “She’s right.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: The End! Thank you everyone for reading this! I can’t believe this was originally supposed to be a short dedication to [pocketsizedtitan](http://pocketsizedtitan.co.vu/). Well Tanja, it looks like you got yourself a 47K word fic :}
> 
> [This song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpnUrPUlJXY) is the only reason I finished this fic.
> 
> It was a fun journey, and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. As a last parting gift I will now give you the alternate ending I wrote when I was at my wit’s end:
> 
> [This takes place right after Eren explodes through the barricade like a valiant dog who ran through the streamers hanging from the doorway at a child’s birthday party or a brave horse running through a field of fragile little prairie flowers in a light drizzle… either way it was easy and not impressive at all.]
> 
> Eren soared down the mountain in a glorious way reserved only for mountain gods spurred on by a wild fear that his crush was already crushed by a boulder or executed in some other way. He leapt in impressive synchrony with the other creatures of the forest (with the exception of the snakes, who’s leaps were more like flops) until he could see the village below. Like John Smith in Colors of the Wind [insert Disney copyright shit here] he leapt and leapt and leapt some more (and the snakes flung and flopped and flipped some more).
> 
> By the time he got to the village, Eren was thirsty for blood. He opened his jaw wide, ready to yell the command out to his comrades to rip the humans to shreds, when Mikasa interrupted politely.
> 
> “Excuse me,” she said, holding up a hand. She and the other villagers were gathered around a box, about the height of … oh I don’t know… a human being named Jean, and they had no weapons nor looked ready for the bloody battle Eren was expected to unleash upon their squishy flesh.
> 
> “What’s this?” Eren asked, caught off guard.
> 
> “Open it,” said Mikasa.
> 
> Eren walked up to the gift and saw it had a lock on it.
> 
> “How am I supposed to open it?” asked Eren, puzzled. “Unless…”
> 
> He looked down at the key around his neck. It couldn’t be… could it?
> 
> Eren slowly pulled the necklace off over his head, grasped the key in his right hand, stuck it into the keyhole, and turned it.
> 
> Click!
> 
> “Surprise!” Jean popped out of the present.
> 
> “Happy birthday!” yelled all the villagers in perfect unison, making the recently mentioned synchronized leaping seem less impressive.
> 
> Eren got all teary-eyed. “Really? For me?”
> 
> “Yeah, you dummy,” said Mikasa, coming over and punching him lightly on the shoulder.
> 
> They all laughed. Armin laughed so hard that they could hear him at the top of the mountain. It was joyous indeed!
> 
> Eren and Jean rode Bucky off into the sunset, or so they wish but it was really only lunchtime by then, so they rode on Bucky off into the blue sky with the noon-thirty sun hanging high above them.
> 
> The end.


End file.
